Tide of Crimson Colour (Kran do Sahqon Fahin)
by Morninglight
Summary: Sequel to From the Sea I Come (Nol faal Okaaz Zu'u Meyz). There are two Dragonborns, their paths wildly divergent though they share the same blood. One focuses on politics and the other on Alduin World-Eater, while off the north coast of Skyrim a vampiric overlord will seek to blot out the sun so that his kind may reign supreme...
1. The Thane's Duty

Note: Thanks for reading and reviewing! Some sexual innuendo in this chapter.

…

**The Thane's Duty**

Balgruuf had never been happier to see a woman as he was to see Tolal, accompanied by the Norc bard Oleg and two Companions, enter the Great Hall. The Dragonborn had grown in confidence, though new lines of grief bracketed her mer-large eyes and generous mouth, no doubt related to the news from Winterhold. She'd also switched her mage robes for decently made fur-trimmed leather armour studded with orichalcum and wore an orichalcum axe on her hip… and a quicksilver katana sheathed across her back.

The Companions were Celende and Aela, moving with wolfish grace he knew came from the beast-blood. Everyone, Oleg included, left their visible weapons on the rack by the door and strode up to his throne like they belonged at the high table. By the old laws of hospitality, they did.

"My Jarl," the Dragonborn greeted, her husky voice raw with barely suppressed grief and the hint of a rumble from the Thu'um. "I've returned."

"I'm glad to see you," Balgruuf admitted as he rose from his throne. "There has been… trouble."

"Well, there's been trouble everywhere in Skyrim because of zealots who would see the world burn and others who squabble over pebbles when an avalanche looms over them," the Norc woman – this close to Oleg, he could see the resemblance clear as the sun on a summer's day – countered sardonically. "Thanks to the Thalmor, northern Skyrim has a new harbour where Winterhold used to be. Thanks to _Celende,_ there's no more Jarl of Winterhold."

Balgruuf's eyebrow shot up as he looked at the Altmer Harbinger pointedly.

"The mages uncovered a dangerous artefact through no fault of their own and Ancano managed to nearly unmake the world with it," the golden-skinned warrior answered bluntly. "Korir executed the members of the College who'd stayed behind to evacuate the village and _we_ executed him for denying them their right to a Holdthing."

The Jarl of Whiterun grunted sourly. "You have that right, Harbinger. But Ulfric will make use of an Altmer executing one of his loyal Thanes politically to stir support to his side."

"If that's the case, I'll pass Wuuthrad to Farkas and resign as Harbinger for the good of the Companions," she responded serenely. "But Ulfric's a damned fool for playing politics when the world is threatened by Alduin."

"On that front, I have some good news," Tolal interjected. "I've learned that the ancient Tongues used a Shout to defeat Alduin. I'm off to High Hrothgar to learn it."

Balgruuf sighed in relief. "That is a blessing, Tolal. But… I need you somewhere else."

He started walking upstairs to the Great Porch, where no one would dare eavesdrop. Tellingly, Oleg followed, expression thoughtful. The Norc was too damned shrewd at times for Balgruuf's comfort.

Once they were on the stone ledge where Numinex had been trapped, Balgruuf sighed once more, this time explosively. "Killing Korir has tilted the political balance in favour of the Stormcloaks. I need to find a way to even the keel until Alduin is dealt with – and to rescue the son of a Thane."

"The Thalmor have Thorald Grey-Mane," Celende explained to the Dragonborn as she simply raised an eyebrow. "It was going to be just me and Aela in the beginning, but I assume that Balgruuf's making a point…?"

"The Stormcloaks and those fucking Alik'r fired the Thalmor Embassy after murdering everyone inside," Balgruuf confirmed flatly. He'd been floored by the boldness of both parties – and worried, because Ulfric could take Falkreath and hem him on both sides with the Redguards. "If we can rescue Thorald and destroy their keep at Northwatch-"

"The Thalmor have tried to kill me twice," Tolal growled, eyes glittering. "I know the area well – and how to hide the bodies."

The sturdy Dragonborn pulled off her backpack, smiling tightly as she withdrew a bundle wrapped in the finest butter-soft deer-suede. "I've got something else that will also spike that bastard Ulfric's wheel, my Jarl. He tried to manipulate me by taking Jurgen Windcaller's horn to Windhelm so I'd have to come for it. So I robbed him blind… and found this."

She unwrapped the suede to reveal a crown of greyish-brown fangs, each the size of a curved dagger, set into a plain steel band. Balgruuf's breath caught in his throat as he breathed in Dovahzul, "Gaar alzit od, do dovah nol bii drun tum, kiindah paagol felniirri so, faal Lok Jun ko ok Alzit Du'ul."

"'Maw unleashing razor snow, of dragons from the blue brought down, births the walking winter's woe, the High King in his Jagged Crown'," Oleg translated smugly. "Tolal didn't know what she had until she showed me."

"I don't need to be Olava to know you're the current kingmaker in Skyrim, my Jarl," Tolal added as she placed the crown before him. "So be it in truth. Or make yourself High King, which wouldn't be a bad choice either."

"Are you saying this because I am your Jarl?" Balgruuf asked softly. "I can tell you are kin to the Foe-Reaper-"

"Gorek is now Chief," Oleg interrupted sorrowfully. "Father chose the sword-death over the straw-death."

Again the political landscape in Skyrim shifted with a few terse words. "I mourn for your father's death even as I rejoice in him going to his no doubt rightful reward, be it with Malacath or Shor," Balgruuf responded sincerely.

Oleg nodded with a brief sad smile. "I chose to take a path which led me away from Half-Moon Hold. I will marry a Nord woman and stay wherever she is, to strengthen our ties with the First Men, as the snow-blood's running a little thin."

"And Cousin Saibash will also be taking a Nord wife," Tolal added quietly. "He's dropping hints to me to find a spouse, but I've got more important things to worry about, like the end of the world."

"I'd marry you, if you'd have me," Balgruuf told her. They were compatible enough in bed – the fishing trip had shown that – and having the Dragonborn as his spouse-

"I know. But I would make you a better Thane than a bride," Tolal answered with a hint of regret. "If _you_ were a Thane also, my Jarl, it would work. But I can do more for Whiterun as a Thane than as a Jarl's wife."

Balgruuf's hand clenched into a fist as he stifled the pang of hurt, forcing himself to look at the situation fairly objectively and admit that Tolal was right. "I… understand," he finally said.

"Hell, for the tongue-trick alone I'd marry you if the political situation wasn't such a damned mess," Tolal added with a slight smile, startling a laugh out of the Jarl with her honesty.

"This from the woman who can deep-throat my greatsword," he drawled.

"_Back_ to Northwatch Keep," Aela said hastily. Her preference for women was well known in Whiterun. "We would need to hit the place soon. And if all else fails, Tolal will have to cut and run."

"Agreed." Balgruuf sighed, losing the flash of humour. He hated to put his people at risk, but the Thalmor needed to be purged from Skyrim and Tolal was the only woman with the expertise to pull it off.

"It gets better," the Dragonborn growled. "It seems that the Alik'r have a Dragonborn. And the bastard's apparently my paternal uncle."

"I knew of Irkand, but not that he was your uncle," Balgruuf answered with a sigh.

"He's been playing politics while I've been doing the hard work against Alduin," she continued. "I think we need to have a talk."

"Agreed." Balgruuf wanted the man out of Skyrim. Or even dead-

Irileth opened the doors to the Great Porch without leave, striding up towards the table with a tight expression that conveyed a mixture of vengeful glee and huscarl's worry. "My Jarl, I just received information from Solitude that you needed to hear immediately," she explained.

"Nice to see you too, Irileth," Tolal said, voice still edged.

"Hmmph." Irileth didn't look fazed. "I have good news, bad news and… interesting news."

Balgruuf's lips pursed. "Bad news first."

"No, I must begin with the interesting news. Stormcloaks and Alik'r managed to assassinate Titus Mede II."

A silence so deep and sepulchral that Balgruuf fancied it would be how the world would be after Alduin ate the concept of sound fell suddenly over the group. "I… would have thought that the bad news," the Jarl finally said. "This will invite the Dominion to invade."

"In chaos there is opportunity, my Jarl. The bad news is that the Redguards have been talking about imperial ambitions, according to my sources just over the border in Hammerfell. The good news… is that Ulfric Stormcloak is dead."

"'The sweetest spot in the rotten apple's always next to the worm'," Celende observed dryly. "I hear good news and better news, because Titus Mede II left my family to die at Pale Pass, and Ulfric's a racist ass."

Tolal turned away from them, rubbing her chin thoughtfully. "We need to purge the Thalmor and make it known it was by your order," she told Balgruuf over her shoulder. "The Stormcloaks are leaderless – or near enough – and you have the Jagged Crown. You know politics better than I, but if you can harness the traditionalists' anger and unite them with the loyalists-"

"I have no wish to be High King!" Balgruuf snapped at the woman.

"And I'm not overly fond of being the Dragonborn. At the moment, you hold all the cards, my Jarl," Tolal retorted flatly. "Elisif's a damned baby who hasn't even killed her ice wraith and the next likely candidate for the Stormcloaks will be the fucking Silver-Bloods, and what I've heard of them – _no_. It's either the Jagged Crown on your head, my Jarl, or your head on a pike – because no one will tolerate your neutrality with Korir dead."

Oleg was nodding in agreement. "As High King, you could make my brother the ninth Jarl," he said quietly. "The Norcs _must_ join the Moot or we'll die within two generations."

"Much as I loathe to meddle in politics, they're right," Celende added grimly. "If the Redguards have the bright idea of conquering Cyrodiil-"

"-They have themselves a ruthless Dragonborn already," Aela finished.

Balgruuf's response wasn't that particularly polite, involving the Huntress, her Harbinger and Wuuthrad in possibly blasphemous terms, much to Oleg and Tolal's amusement.

"I can think of no one better to be High King," Irileth added.

"Oh, fuck you," Balgruuf snapped at his Dunmer huscarl.

"Been there, done that, taught you the tongue-trick," the dark elf retorted.

Tolal roared with laughter. "You taught him well!"

Balgruuf turned to the Dragonborn. "I want Thorald back here within the week, dead or alive, and every Thalmor in that keep dead. I want as many records as you can get. And then I want you to kick that black bastard Alduin's scaly lizard ass back to whence it came."

Tolal bowed slightly, her expression no longer humorous, but now grim. "It will be done, my Jarl."

"Good… Good." Balgruuf's fists clenched. The Dragonborn was right; she was better as his Thane than his wife.

"He's technically of Jorrvaskr, so we'll join you," Celende told Tolal. "Besides, I owe the blackcoats a debt of blood and pain that will not be repaid until the shores of Alinor run red."

The Dragonborn met the Harbinger's eyes. "You're fucked in the head," she answered bluntly. "And one day, that lust for death will get people on our side killed."

And with those words, she stalked from the Great Porch, no doubt to prepare for the journey to Northwatch Keep. Balgruuf felt a chill run down his spine as he realised that the Dragonborn had spoken, wittingly or unwittingly, true prophecy.

_"Dragons can look forward in time as well as back,"_ he recalled Arngeir lecturing a pair of bored novices one day.

Balgruuf sighed and turned away himself. Ulfric was a bastard but he was also a man he'd known and deserved the warrior's vigil of honour and prayers to Talos. If no one else would do it, the Jarl of Whiterun would, and with a merry heart.


	2. Succession

Note: Thanks for reading and reviewing! Trigger warning for execution and mentions of torture.

…

**Succession**

"I am no lord to command in Ulfric's place. Choose another to lead us and if he is worthy, I will follow."

Galmar Stone-Fist's voice was as empty as the gaze which looked at the Stormcloak commanders gathered around the war table in Windhelm. They had gained a mighty victory for Skyrim and shaken the Empire to its core… but at a terrible cost. Even the remaining Redguard (no, Ra Gada as they preferred) Alik'r, Irkand Dragonborn amongst them, were stricken with Ulfric's loss. The stocky, half-Imperial Dovahkiin had gashed his cheeks in grief for the Jarl of Windhelm and apologised, offering his life in the Blades' manner, but Galmar and Ralof had refused gently. Even heartbroken at losing their leader, the Stormcloaks couldn't hold the Alik'r responsible, not when they had mutual enemies and had every reason for a free Skyrim on their northern flank.

_"Colovians crave order and stability. At the best of times, this makes them the king-pillar of Tamriel. At the worst of times, it makes them slaves to anyone who offers a little peace, no matter the cost,"_ Sudrith of the Forebears (Ralof was beginning to understand the political divisions amongst the Ra Gada) explained on the trip back to Windhelm with Ulfric's body. _"Even Irkand is prone to that fault. We want Cyrodiil stable – we _need_ Cyrodiil stable – but we have no desire to re-enact Talos' conquests. Bruma is yours if Skyrim wants it once we have… pacified the Imperial Province."_

The Ra Gada second-in-command had taken Ralof aside to explain some of the nebulous plans the Alik'r were making; though they had no reason to love Talos, they respected the Divine and promised to restore His places of worship in Cyrodiil, and the return of the Home of the Summer Wind was a powerful promise. _"We cannot fight the Dominion alone, and no offence, but the First Men can keep Skyrim. We'd rather a free Skyrim as a willing ally than a subjugated race of gloryhound warriors itching to kick the Alik'r out."_

Pragmatic, perhaps a touch insulting, but Ralof figured he'd feel the same about the desolate wastes of the Hammerfell deserts. The Ra Gada and the Nords had much in common even as they were wildly different… and for some reason, they seemed to respect Ralof considerably.

But for this meeting, the Alik'r weren't present: this was pure Nord business. They needed a new Jarl of Windhelm… and a new commander. A new person worthy of the High Kingship.

"Most of us were chosen because we were Legion veterans who knew their respective home Holds," Hjornskar Head-Smasher agreed. "Like it or not, we need someone who can also deal with outsiders. As much as I mourn the loss of Ulfric, the conditional alliance with the Alik'r has delivered the greatest amount of victory we've achieved; Tullius and the Emperor dead, the Thalmor all but thrown out of Skyrim…"

"But we've also lost. An Altmer Harbinger striking a Jarl down!" Frokmar Banner-Torn pointed out bitterly.

Kai Wet-Pommel, the former commander of the Winterhold forces, pursed his lips grimly. "Korir's loss was grievous only as a vote. I know that Celende is no friend of the Thalmor."

"She's Aurelii. Irkand flat-out said she was insane," Ralof agreed. "It is… troubling… but she is Harbinger, and unless we want a war with the Companions, we cannot gainsay her decision for she followed the due processes and Korir did not."

"Whatever happened at Winterhold, we now have a new harbour that needs to be settled before the Imperials take it," Kai confirmed pragmatically. "We need to shore up alliances – win the Norcs over, for instance. Hrafn was nearly as neutral as Balgruuf, but his price was always clear: a seat on the Moot as a Jarl in his own right. And if the Norcs were pureblooded, we'd have agreed. But Gorek… He's a different kettle of fish. He'll demand a Nord bride for himself or one of his brothers to bind us together. And even with the Foe-Reaper's demise, we do _not_ dare attack Half-Moon Hold. Not with Tolal Dragonborn running around."

Gunnar Oath-Giver nodded grimly. "My source in the Thieves' Guild confirmed that she's the one who took the Jagged Crown along with the Horn of Jurgen Windcaller when Ulfric tried to manipulate her."

Frokmar Banner-Torn grunted sourly. "You think the Alik'r are good? From Windhelm to Solitude, that woman knows the coastline of northern Skyrim like the back of her hand. Half the time she'd hunt horkers alone on her foster father's fishing boat. Tolal Dragonborn isn't one I wish as an enemy, more so than Irkand, because she was raised in Skyrim and fights as one of us. She practices the old hunting magics and rumour has it managed to outwit a seasoned Blade."

Ralof sighed. "I wager, given she's a Thane of Whiterun and steadfastly neutral, Balgruuf has the Jagged Crown now. Tolal and Irkand are two sides of the same coin: both Dragonborn, both without ambition… yet complete polar opposites."

"And both kindred, if my intelligence is correct." Galmar looked mournfully at Ulfric's axe lain across the Throne of Ysgramor in memory of their hero. "So the future of Skyrim rests in the hands of a gold-hungry merchant who haggles over every clipped septim."

"We need allies." Ralof sighed again, pushing himself up from the table. "I would gladly send a Nord maiden to Gorek. The Norcs aren't our enemies for all they chased Ulfric out at crossbow point. After the words he exchanged with Gorek, a man mourning for his father, well… Demanding never won us anything from the Norcs and it's not going to start now."

"Gorek has a Hunts-Wife from Largashbur," Gunnar Oath-Giver agreed immediately. "The second wife is always the Forge-Wife, even in Half-Moon Hold. If Hermir Strong-Heart is willing, we can send her to Gorek."

Ralof winced inwardly at the thought of the girl who had such a crush on Ulfric being forced to marry a Norc, but Gunnar was correct, and he himself had suggested the course. "The Norcs are… honourable. They'll keep their word."

"And we can box in Balgruuf, though I'd wager the Norcs are allied with him formally because of Tolal," Hjornskar agreed. "The Jarl of Whiterun's a chaffering bastard, but he lost father and brother to the Thalmor, and was forced to rebuild his city from near-ruin after the Great War. We need him to raise the capital we'll need to ruin the Empire's trade."

Ralof scrubbed his bearded chin thoughtfully. "I grew up in Whiterun. Balgruuf's a good ruler for all his gold-hungry ways. Ulfric was going to replace him with Vignar Grey-Mane in the wake of conquering Whiterun, but…"

"But?" Galmar asked, leaning forward intently.

"Balgruuf has the Jagged Crown or soon will have. He is a fine ruler and administrator but poor warleader. I say we proclaim him High King – because I wager he's been talked into it already by Tolal and that Dunmer lover of his – and surround him with a ring of steel in Whiterun. We end the war and keep any trouble away from him… And he'll be so busy rebuilding Skyrim's trade and filling her coffers that he won't notice the fact that we control the military and can crush him at any time. _We_ come across as willing to temporarily sacrifice our honour for the good of Skyrim and if he refuses… Well, _he_ loses his honour and his own Thanes, Tolal Dragonborn included, might very well turn against him."

Galmar grunted in displeasure. "If it weren't for the dragons and the Thalmor-"

"I'd lead the charge against Whiterun myself," Ralof finished, meeting his commander's eyes. "But we can also neatly keep the Alik'r out of this. They want a free Skyrim, but one friendly to them, and one that is malleable to their wishes. _Both _sides would prefer the other be a shield between them and the Dominion."

Gunnar, well-versed in political dealings, was already nodding. "I like it. Balgruuf's sharper than Laila, and it will mean we'll need to be polite to the greyskins, but… It could very well work. And it keeps Torygg's woman off the throne."

"The Alik'r have ambitions for the Ruby Throne but they've already promised all our ancient lands back to us," Ralof continued quietly. "Bruma, Sancre Tor…! They've even agreed to allow the worship of Talos again in their lands, though they've little love for the Stormcrown."

"High King Sura's getting ambitious, I see," drawled Thorygg Sun-Killer, the commander of Falkreath Hold. "Can we afford to let them have it?"

"We need temporary peace for now," Galmar said unhappily. "We need Alduin dead. Ralof's right, unfortunately. We'll all going to have kneel and fellate that bastard Balgruuf."

The man from Riverwood sighed in relief. They couldn't continue the civil war from their position and the Empire would need to fall back to a defensible position around Solitude, assuming that they didn't flee altogether. And Balgruuf _was_ the best choice to rebuild a kingdom devastated by war.

But he was also in his late forties and unlikely to wed again. And Torygg had proved the disaster of having a High King who'd only received his throne because of the Empire. The High Kings should be chosen for competence, not for connections.

"More importantly, we're going to need a Jarl of Windhelm," Galmar added, meeting Ralof's eyes. "You've spent half of your life at Ulfric's side and you're still young, Ralof Stormblade. Ulfric declared all the Stormcloak survivors of Helgen his blood-brothers… and if need be, heirs. I'm too old and you are the last of the Helgen survivors. So you are Ulfric's heir… and the commander of the Stormcloaks."

Ralof shook his head. "_You_ command the Stormcloaks, old bear. And I am a lumberjack's son from Riverwood."

"Irkand Dragonborn and Delphine both told me that if the Blades were still kicking, they'd have recruited you in a heartbeat. You extracted Ulfric from Helgen… and brought his body home from the Katariah. The Alik'r respect you. And this plan is yours. Now get on that damned throne, take Nilsine Shatter-Shield to wife, and live up to Ulfric's faith in you."

Ralof was a Stormcloak, used to obeying Galmar's commands. And in this, he followed orders.

…

Hadvar buried his face in his hands as the last of the foreign-born Legionnaires marched across the border back into Cyrodiil. Rikke falling on her sword and General Tullius dying… left a whole lot of unhappy soldiers and a good many Legates who wanted to return home. So they left.

But that left five hundred Nord Legionnaires and two Legates: Skulnar and himself. And it seemed that the Falkreath Legate felt that Hadvar should be in command.

He pulled himself to his feet and scrubbed at his unshaven face as Skulnar neared. "Now what, Legate Primus?" he asked.

"We find the Alik'r and kill them," Hadvar grated. "I wager they'll have taken over the nearby Dark Brotherhood Sanctuary. My unit was to deal with them before Irkand and Delphine did, so I have the pass phrase."

Hadvar had failed his Emperor… but he could avenge the ancient man who'd sacrificed so much to buy the world some time to prepare for another battle.

Skulnar nodded with tight satisfaction. Nords kept their oaths to protect the Empire and to avenge what couldn't be protected.

It wasn't that far away to the Sanctuary, especially from Fort Neugrad, and there were only five Alik'r there. Irkand Aurelius wasn't one of them, more's the pity, so Hadvar settled for hanging their corpses from the ceiling before setting the Sanctuary alight. Finding the battered, beaten wreck that was Gaius Maro the Younger enraged the normally steady Nord.

"Yes, we failed the Emperor and the Empire's abandoned Skyrim," Hadvar agreed as he and Skulnar poured healing energy into the man so he could move. "But we can avenge Titus Mede and those we failed. Dying will do nothing."

Maro grimaced, showing broken teeth that could never be repaired. "I hope Father escaped. He's a good chance at the Ruby Throne… and well, that's what the Alik'r want."

Hadvar grunted sourly as he and Skulnar helped the man to his feet, an arm slung over each shoulder so that he could limp along. "We need to strengthen Markarth and Falkreath then. Hopefully Igmund won't be completely useless…"

Skulnar snorted sceptically as they left the Sanctuary burning in their wake. Let Irkand know that there were Legionnaires still in Skyrim and that in the end, it was Nord blood that had built and sustained the Empire.


	3. The Winter's Cold Wind

Note: Thanks for reading and reviewing! Trigger warning for fantastic racism, implied torture, PTSD and a massacre. Totally screwing about with Dawnguard questions because I can.

…

**The Winter's Cold Wind**

Commander Olendilar sighed, breath frosting white in the Auriel-forsaken icy wind that blew off the Sea of Ghosts. Skyrim was the epitome of all that was wrong with this broken world and yet the Nords, like the beetles that rolled dung to make their homes, adored it that way. Sometimes he wished he was a better Conjuror, to call forth a plague that would wipe every one last of the hairy brutes from this wretched place. But if he were to try, he'd wipe himself out.

Let it not be said, however, that Olendilar shirked his duty. He stood gate-guard during this bleak night to set an example for his younger brethren. Elenwen was dead, tortured by Ulfric it was said, and both Nurancars besides. They had been… enthusiastic… by Thalmor standards. Olendilar was no fanatic. He served because it was his duty.

Snow creaked in the darkness, startling him before a magelight blazed to reveal another Altmer, this one a woman with flat high cheekbones and short black hair that was coarse enough to be a human's. Most of the Thalmor despised those with the blood of humans in them but Olendilar had always thought – once they'd been properly sterilised to make sure they didn't dilute their blood further – the thin-bloods should be given a chance. Though judging by this woman's bare arms and lack of shivering in the cold night wind, this part-Nord would be better suited to menial tasks involving brute force.

"Halt," Olendilar commanded calmly. Not haughtily – it was one thing to be proud and another to be arrogant – but with enough authority to stop the Altmer in her tracks. "You have entered a military facility."

"I figured that with all the guards in black and gold on the walls," she drawled. "Given that your superior was executed rather painfully – her ribcage split and opened so that the lungs could expand – I would have thought the Thalmor would have chosen to leave."

"All non-essential personnel have been returned to Alinor but there are Dominion citizens we cannot allow to suffer at the hands of the Nords, so we wait for them to escape before leaving," Olendilar told her. "As a fellow Altmer, even one of mixed blood, you would be allowed our protection."

"I think not." Her tone was almost as icy as the northern wind. "My mother was murdered by the Thalmor at Pale Pass. Crucified, you see, for being the consort of Talos Stormcrown."

Olendilar flinched as she drew the two-handed battleaxe from her back, the weapon gleaming ebon in the magelight. Then he knew fear as he realised he was paralysed. "You're Aurelii," he managed to rasp.

"Celende. Aurelia Gold-Lily to some. I am the Harbinger and I wield Wuuthrad, the axe of Ysgramor." Celende's grin was almost demonic as she lifted the battleaxe, etched with the screaming face of a Falmer. "And one day, I'm going to wash the shores of Alinor in Thalmor blood."

Wuuthrad slashed down and Olendilar knew no more.

…

Celende sighed as the Thalmor commander, cut in two, gurgled his last breath through a mouthful of blood. A tall figure in snow-white furs, masked with a mottled grey scarf across the lower half of her face, paused from finishing off the last of the wall guards.

"That was without honour," Tolal Dragonborn said flatly. "As Harbinger, you're meant to embody it."

The Altmer werewolf declined to argue with the woman. Technically her cousin a few dozen times removed, the Norc was oftentimes as morally flexible as a Khajiit thief but just as likely to be as rigid as Vilkas in her sense of honour. "If your enemies have no honour, don't show any to them," she pointed out.

"Next time, cut your foes down and save the monologue," Tolal countered irritably before striding to the door. She was pissed at this detour, all because of politics, when Alduin World-Eater lurked on the horizon.

Celende sighed, shaking her head. She wouldn't understand. She had a child's knowledge of honour.

Aela, in beast form, followed the Dragonborn and Celende envied her wife that revelry. But the Harbinger needed to keep her wits about herself so she couldn't indulge in the sort of bloodlust she normally would when confronted by a few dozen Thalmor. There were prisoners in this fortress who needed rescuing and Celende had little control over her urges in beast form.

She was the last inside, following Oleg, to find three dead Thalmor being devoured by Aela. Tolal was engaged in fighting another, flinging Flames with one hand and her steel axe in the other, while Oleg was cranking up his crossbow to take down a mage whose hands flickered with electricity.

It got very bad for the blackcoats after her appearance. Room by room, hallway by hallway, they died at the hands of those who had every reason to see them die. Finally, they reached the interrogation chamber, where a filthy, dishevelled Nord barely recognisable as Thorald Grey-Mane hung from chains next to a skeleton, a blackcoat turning from him with lightning blooming between outstretched fingers.

Tolal's steel hand-axe split his skull in two as her lips peeled back in a snarl. It seemed she had enough Orc in her to go berserk because the final two guards didn't last long either, the Norc throwing her axe to catch the last fleeing one in the back.

Celende decided to give the Dragonborn some space by going to pull the levers which opened the cell doors. A group of half-dead, half-crazed prisoners ran for the nearest exit, uncaring of the fact they'd probably freeze to death in the snows outside.

"Unnnggh… Who…?" Thorald moaned, his voice thready with pain, as he managed to open pale blue eyes. "Flee… Thalmor… Self-destruct spell."

Oleg picked the locks as Aela checked for loot. There was enough to make this profitable, even with the reasons being politically altruistic. Celende had seen scenes like this several times when fighting the Thalmor, so she was unbothered.

Tolal, eyes still wild, caught the pureblood. "Let's go."

It was Aela who heard the rumble first. "We need to move, now!" she yelled, putting action to word, Celende on her heels and Oleg following them. But Tolal lingered, trying to help the no doubt crippled Thorald escape.

Celende had just enough time to dive for cover as the keep exploded. When the dust settled down, she turned around and swore vociferously. Of Tolal and Thorald, there was nothing. Only dust and ashes.

The sole remaining Dragonborn was a murderer. Hircine help them all.

…

Tolal had just enough time to breathe Become Ethereal before the Keep exploded. Now insubstantial, she and Thorald fell through the earth, landing somewhere in a dank dark cave that still glittered gold with some kind of mer craftsmanship. A startled cry caught her attention as she recovered from falling into a deep pool; then she was pulled out after Thorald, coughing and spluttering.

"I have seen many things in my time, but never ghostly Nords fall like rain."

The voice was hoarse, as if rarely used, and a decidedly mer face peered down at them. For all that, he was pale as the snow outside, white-haired and grey-eyed. If anything, Tolal would claim he was Falmer, but he was… whole.

"Can you heal? My friend was tortured by Thalmor and he needs treatment."

The mer's face creased in a slightly sardonic smile. "Two unlikely things. Nords asking the last of the Snow Elves for help in Auri-El's sanctuary."

But he knelt by Thorald and poured golden healing light into him, Tolal supplementing his efforts with what little she could. She was lousy at Restoration magic.

"Thank you," she told the Snow Elf as he squatted back on his haunches, wearing black, grey and white armour that was mer in design but decorated with almost Nordic loops. "I apologise for my poor manners, but… I wasn't expecting to fall through the earth to escape an explosion."

"Auri-El's light shines on all, man and mer alike," the Falmer responded serenely. "I am Knight-Paladin Gelebor, the last of the Snow Elves, that which were once called the Falmer and now are the Betrayed."

Tolal vaguely recalled Auri-El being the elves' father-god, some aspect of Akatosh. "I am Tolal Dragonborn and my companion is Thorald Grey-Mane," she greeted formally. "I apologise if we have intruded on your solitude."

"It is no intrusion." Gelebor watched the filthy, rag-clad Thorald sit up with a groan. "Thalmor – that is an Aldmeri word."

"It's an Altmer faction," Tolal growled. "Trying to end the world."

"With blood, pain and torture? Are they _trying_ to drive us all into the jaws of Oblivion?" Gelebor's voice was horrified. "If not for my duty, I'd-" He snapped his mouth shut, grey eyes glittering. "Forgive me, Dragonborn. You are guests, however unexpected, and it isn't for me to bother you with my burdens."

"You have given us shelter and healing." Astonishingly, it was the recently tortured Thorald who spoke. "By our honour, we owe you a debt, mer."

He was right. Tolal sighed, shaking her head. "I'm sorry if I sound reluctant, but Alduin flies on the wing and would devour the world. I may not be able to help _now_, but-"

"Dragonborn, the sooner we discharge this debt, the easier it will be able to confront Alduin," Thorald said fiercely. "I will not go to Sovngarde owing a debt, even to a mer."

Tolal stared as the man staggered to his feet, pale skin now scored with dozens of fine lines from lightning. "They wanted to make me an 'asset', a spy to report on Ulfric, so they treated me relatively lightly," he continued, eyes glittering. "You came in good time, Dovahkiin. I would have broken within a few hours. Even now, I am brittle."

"My burden is heavy, the duty heavier still, but not so much as the need to defeat Alduin," Gelebor observed quietly. "I have spent… a long time guarding this place. A few more months or years will make no difference."

"Thorald, you look like shit and as you said, you're brittle. Why would you throw your life away when Jarl Balgruuf sent me and the others to rescue you?" Tolal asked the pureblood bluntly.

"Because a debt is owed, Dragonborn." Thorald's answer was simple. "I will have to join the Stormcloaks for the protection of my family-"

"Ulfric was killed," Tolal interrupted with her customary tact and diplomacy. "While assassinating Titus Mede II."

"The Colovian Emperor?" Thorald's hands clenched. "I thought the Thalmor lying. They told me that the only way I could protect my family was to become one of their spies, because the Dominion was going to crush both Skyrim and the Empire with Titus Mede dead. I… nearly cracked, Dragonborn. They were so certain… But I told myself Ulfric was alive, they were trying to break me with lies…"

He broke down into sobs, Tolal watching him helplessly for a moment before giving him a hug. In response he flung her away with a burst of hysterical strength. She backed off, hands raised calmingly, as Gelebor watched serenely.

Finally he stopped, raising pale blue eyes that glittered with tears. "Forgive me, Dragonborn, I-"

"You were bound and tortured. Having your arms held against your body must have startled you." Tolal's smile was a little bleak. "I once saw a man trapped in a boat and nearly drowning when it overturned. He couldn't handle the sea or tight spaces after that and moved to Riften. I should have realised it."

"You are generous, Dragonborn." Thorald hung his head, no doubt ashamed of showing weakness in front of a mer, even one who'd proven to be helpful and to whom he felt they owed a debt. "I… need to do this. I understand that Alduin is a more pressing threat for you…"

Tolal growled in frustration. They were stuck only the gods knew how deep underground, for some reason Thorald was insisting on being a true Nord when he was barely rescued from the Thalmor's torturers, and she owed this Gelebor a debt. "What is this 'burden' of yours?" she asked the mer curtly.

He sighed and laid out a grim story on how his brother had once been the High Priest of Auri-El, but had been trapped and corrupted by the Betrayed (the Falmer everyone loved to hate), therefore preventing access to Auri-El's temple… and the bow of Auri-El. Other adventurers had come and gone but Gelebor had always remained to guard the entrance to the Chantry.

"A hard thing to send others to their deaths," he said with another sigh. "But if I leave this shrine, the way to the upper world will be unlocked and if I should fall, Vyrthur will be free to wreak havoc on the world with his wretched prophecy of drowning the sun in blood."

Tolal sighed, shaking her head. "I can do this alone."

"No." Thorald's voice was reedy but firm. "You cannot be lost, Dragonborn, if Alduin is upon the wing. I am… physically healed. Perhaps in paying my debt to Gelebor, I can regain some of my lost honour and heal inwardly."

"I need to find a way to send a mage-message to… Bloody hell, I was the best mage of the lot of us and I'm a lousy Conjuror," Tolal growled. "Get some sleep and we'll… figure this shit tomorrow."

Why was it that the world kept on throwing minor but critical problems at her when Alduin needed killing?

Tolal laid out a bedroll for Thorald, who just had to be a git and refuse it until she growled with the edge of the Thu'um in her voice. She could sneak out tomorrow, kill this Vyrthur, return Thorald to his parents and then go back to dealing with Alduin.

Soon enough she was asleep and dreaming of a great black dragon that drove all before it, including Thorald and herself…


	4. The Seven-Score Cuts of Shame

Note: Thanks for reading and reviewing. Sorry about the slow update, but I've been playing Dragon Age: Inquisition. Trigger warning for PTSD.

…

**The Seven-Score Cuts of Shame**

Irkand knew whence the smoke in the sky came. He and Sudrith exchanged glances and bowed their heads to say a prayer for the dead brothers lost to whoever raided the Sanctuary. It was likely retreating Imperials, a petty victory on the return to Cyrodiil, but he would slay ten Colovians for every dead Alik'r.

"We are too few to offer more than token support to Ralof now," Sudrith murmured. The canny Forebear, a master of politics like many of his kind, had manipulated the Stormcloak to accept the position of leadership. The man from Riverwood was competent enough, even a leader – but not a conqueror. There was only enough room in Tamriel for one conqueror and it would be the High King Sura.

"I am worth twenty men," Irkand pointed out grimly as he turned from the sky. "And with Alduin distracted by Tolal-"

One of the scouts cried a challenge, only to grunt as a slender woman in mottled green-and-brown emerged from the underbrush to punch him in the gut. Irkand swore softly as he realised it was Delphine: a grim, hard-eyed Delphine with an expression to make his blood freeze.

"Nice to see we still have a Dragonborn," the Blade announced flatly, unperturbed by the five scouts – and Sudrith – pulling scimitars on her. "Tolal went missing several days ago, somewhere near where Northwatch Keep exploded."

Irkand's blood turned to ice. His niece – dead? At the hands of the Thalmor? "What the hell was she doing near there?" he demanded of the Blade.

"Some kind of raid for Balgruuf to rescue prisoners, according to Celende," the Breton reported. "Gods-fucking-dammit, Irkand! I wholeheartedly approve of Titus Mede returning to Akatosh, but did you have to fucking murder him now? And you got Ulfric killed!"

"Stand down, Tamas," Irkand commanded as one of the Alik'r prepared to hit the Blade from behind. "This is Delphine, a former Blade. She is, in the subject of dragons and killing them, to be treated as an Alik'r sister at all times."

"There's no former about it," Delphine snapped in reply. "_I_ never abandoned my duty, Irkand."

"No, you just tried to fucking manipulate me so you'd have a nice biddable Dragonborn!" the Redguard retorted. "I killed Titus, Nurancar, Tullius and Elenwen to make it safer for Tolal to go about and kill dragons!"

"Oh, fuck off to Heaven's Reach and don't bullshit me," Delphine countered in disgust. "The Redguards fancy themselves the new conquerors of the world and you'll blindly obey this High King Sura even though a _true_ Dragonborn would have the desire to rule himself."

"Just because _you've_ never found a purpose beyond killing Thalmor doesn't mean _I'm_ responsible for giving you one," Irkand said bitterly. "And to think I once loved you."

Dead silence reigned before Sudrith coughed. "Can you two either duel or fuck it out of your systems?" he advised tersely. "The Stormcloaks practically have Skyrim handed to them on a platter and if this other Dragonborn is dead, that makes Alduin your problem, Irkand."

"He's right," Tamas agreed. "That smoke means we have five dead brothers. We can't return to Hammerfell until Alduin is dead, so let's get on with our new mission."

Irkand swore softly and turned away from the now blank-faced Delphine. The fate of the world rested on his shoulders, the man who flinched whenever dragons were mentioned. Why had Tolal managed to get herself killed?

…

To say that Arngeir was displeased at discovering that the second Dragonborn was a Blades executioner who had destabilised Tamriel at the worst possible time was like saying that High Hrothgar was a bit nippy. He took comfort in knowing that Tolal's voice still rang, albeit buried in the earthbones, and that Akatosh obviously believed in having a second string for his bow. Paarthunax had been… terse… in his commands to see the Dragonborns given all due aid, even if the Greybeards were morally outraged by it. Teyvunfahzah had been managing Tolal rather neatly, the huntress strong-willed but happy to listen. Irkand was a stone-cold killer and Delphine little better.

But the Master of the Greybeards obeyed Paarthunax, made all the appropriate noises and sent them in search of an Elder Scroll. Maybe he would be blessed and Tolal would return to save them all without needing to resort to a murderous thug.

…

Three weeks later and Irkand was clutching a golden Elder Scroll in his arms and listening to the seductive voice of Hermaeus Mora offering knowledge in return for the death of an old madman. Not a bad deal, he supposed, when it turned out that the knowledge was the Oghma Infinium. And the Daedric Prince of Fate and Knowledge laughed as a pawn was set into place against another foolish Dragonborn who thought to use instead of being used.

But powers other than the Gardener of Men had eyes to see and ears to hear. And one of them, battered and bleeding but still fighting, turned His thought to how this could be worked to His advantage – and that of Tamriel's.

…

Irkand cried out as he dropped the Elder Scroll, eyes seared with occult patterns that threw him back in time and drew the attention of Alduin like a hawk spotting a mouse. He learned the Shout that brought the World-Eater low but did little more than drive the beast away, the end of all things throwing back a mocking taunt because all he had done was keep Alduin grounded as everyone else did the work of beating him into submission.

There was no pity in Delphine's eyes as he huddled in the wet yellow snow, her silence expressing her contempt more than words could. Paarthunax was not to be seen, the elder dragon fleeing as one of the Alik'r had loosed an arrow at him on Delphine's orders, but his brothers remained sympathetically silent. The Alik'r had been broken once and had learned to bend instead of shatter like a good steel blade.

…

Balgruuf threw the Alik'r out of Whiterun after Irkand refused to pay the bounty, calling him nithing and oathbreaker. "Find another way to trap a dragon for you'll not dishonour my hall," he said flatly. "Tolal was ten times as honourable as you."

It took Celende's eloquence, such as it was, to persuade the Jarl of Whiterun to relent. "You can't be High King if Alduin eats the world," she said flatly. The Harbinger looked troubled by recent events and didn't much seem impressed by Irkand, even though she had even more issues than him.

There was one problem: they didn't have a name for one of Alduin's lieutenants, to call the dragon, best him and find out how to reach Sovngarde, where the World-Eater had gone to feast on the souls of the dead. Balgruuf told him to fuck off and not return until he had a name.

Irkand found himself flensed by shame in ways he didn't feel possible. The Alik'r – such as they were – remained silent and supportive but Delphine's obedience cut seven-score ways as only an Akaviri could manage. He was their only Dragonborn now, a man who couldn't even lift a blade in the presence of a dragon's skeleton, and now they were facing a dead-end.

Sometimes he thought it would be better to let the world be eaten. Better this than endure the shame and fear that crawled through his bones. He had been distracted by the political business and aiding Ulfric, secure that an unbroken Dragonborn faced Alduin, but now the Stormcloaks had almost won and Ulfric was dead. Now he was the only thing between them and the World-Eater.

In his dreams, he wandered Apocrypha and listened to Hermaeus-Mora's mocking laughter. Dread and silent, Sithis waited just beyond, watching with hollow eyes in a crimson-stained skull. Irkand was walking on a frayed thread of knowledge above the Void and only the Daedric Princes knew if he would fall.

…

Irkand was a glass sword – sharp but infinitely fragile. And he was their only hope against Alduin.

Delphine hung her head and sighed as she fed twigs into the guttering fire Sudrith allowed. Balgruuf had stripped her of the Sleeping Giant for consorting with a nithing and the Alik'r tolerated her presence, seeing her as the woman who'd broken their greatest swordsman. Now all she had was her wits, meagre store of dragon knowledge and the katana.

She didn't feel shame. She was doing what she had to. One of them had to be strong and the more ashamed Irkand was, the more he'd listen to her. She wasn't trying to manipulate him, only… guide him. Extensively. He was a weapon who needed a canny hand to wield him.

A stick cracked and Delphine looked up to see a battered old Nord, clad in worn chainmail wrapped in faded blue linen, emerge into the circle of light cast by her campfire. "May I have shelter?" he asked softly.

Tamas of the Alik'r glanced over his shoulder and swore softly. "How did you get past the guard?" he demanded.

The Stormcloak's gaze was wry. "The Reach is my homeland, lad. I wager you'd sneak up on me in the Alik'r Desert."

He spoke perfect Ra Gada as Tamas grudgingly nodded. Delphine supposed he was a veteran mercenary, maybe even a survivor of the Great War, who'd returned to combat after the oppression of the Thalmor.

He sat down with a weary sigh, spots of blood flecking his blue linen wrap. "Been a lot of battles these past thirty years," he observed, keen blue-grey eyes regarding Delphine. "Sometimes when a man – or woman – is caught up in the fighting, they forget the bigger picture."

"Alduin needs to die. There's no bigger picture involved," Delphine retorted tersely.

"And you call yourself a Blade. In my day, Blades knew that sometimes the best way to wield the katana wasn't to draw it at all." The veteran sighed and pulled a wazikashi – the long knife given to all Blades initiates – from his fur boot as Delphine stared. "It's appropriate, in a way, that everything comes back to the Reach. That's where all the bloody mess began, at a little place called Old Hrol'dan."

"Old Hrol'dan set Talos on the path to becoming a Divine," Delphine countered flatly. Perhaps this old Blade had been in deep cover, years ago, and faded into the woodwork. She felt she should know the stern, battered features and still-keen eyes but she couldn't place him.

"Old Hrol'dan set Talos on a path that drowned Tamriel in blood and spawned the Thalmor," he retorted. "Once, the Thalmor were the Altmer equivalent of the Alik'r or the Stormcloaks. Now… well, you know what they are."

The old Blade began to peel a still-sound winter apple he drew from his linen wrap. "Meddling in Herma-Mora's business has awoken things best left alone. Alduin might be the least of your worries soon enough."

"We needed the knowledge," Delphine snapped in reply. "Where were you when the Greybeards called the Dragonborn to High Hrothgar."

"Trying not to fucking bleed to death," the Blade responded acidly. "If you're an example of what the Blades have come to, Esbern might very well be the last true one."

"Esbern's alive?" Delphine asked, wondering how he knew all of this.

"He is. Maybe if you pull your head from your arse and stop trying to play Ralinde's game, you'd be able to find him," the Blade retorted sardonically, eating a slice of apple.

"I am not trying to manipulate Irkand!" Delphine snapped.

Sudrith, blatantly listening in, snorted sceptically.

"Irkand took a soul-wound at Helgen," the Blade, whose name she hadn't gotten, continued calmly. "You're letting it fester – all of you."

"And how would you fix it?" Delphine asked scornfully.

"Lance the wound. I noticed none of you asked him what Helgen was like," the Blade noted. "Let him bitch and moan. Akatosh knows he'll need it."

"We don't have time for Irkand to fall apart!" Delphine snapped at the man.

Those keen eyes became threatening as the storm. "_Make_ the time. Or you will have a broken Blade at the worst possible time."

He arose, shaking his head in disgust. "I see there's no talking sense into you, Delphine, and you'll not obey any orders I give. I'll speak to Esbern instead, reassure him Tolal's alive. Akatosh hedges his bets, I'll give him."

Sudrith stepped in front of him, one hand held out to stop the man from leaving. "The Alik'r thank you for your advice," he said calmly. "Might we have your name, Blade?"

The Blade smiled grimly. "Some call me Hjalti, Ra Gada."

It wasn't until he'd vanished into the night that Delphine remembered that Hjalti was the childhood name of Talos. And yet, incapable of self-reflection as she was, she felt no shame. Who was he to chide her when He'd done nothing to protect the Blades as they died at Cloud Ruler?

Though she didn't realise it, the Blades died that night as Talos turned from them and sought other allies in His fight to survive.


	5. Burdens of Mortality

Note: Thanks for reading and reviewing! Trigger warning for discussion of torture, murder and psychological trauma. The lines Thorald quotes come from the Havamal.

…

**Burdens of Mortality**

Thorald Grey-Mane hissed in pain as his wounds pulled again, the only sign of discomfort he would show in front of Tolal Dragon-Born and the Snow Elf Gelebor. They had reclaimed three of the five Wayshrines of Auri-El, walking the path of wisdom and knowledge that once hundreds of mer had to release themselves from the coils of mortality. _"If you die in grief and despair, you will become Daedra,"_ the Knight-Paladin had explained grimly. _"The Thalmor are fools and Auri-El has undoubtedly turned His face from them."_

He recalled the Altmer Harbinger, when she'd been an adolescent running around with Farkas, Vilkas and Aela, explaining her beliefs to Heimskr. In fact, she openly worshipped Talos as an Aedra, though she didn't believe him one of the Nine Divines. Heimskr, the arse, treated the woman badly but she was half-Nord and raised by Nords besides. He was of Jorrvaskr in his way and because she'd been found worthy by the heirs of Ysgramor, he'd honour that.

"You can stay behind if you want," Tolal said for the third time. "Don't need to prove anything to me about you being a true Nord. You didn't break under the Thalmor."

From anyone else, that would have provoked Thorald into punching them in the face for insulting him. But Tolal was the Dragonborn, sent by Jarl Balgruuf to rescue him from the Thalmor, and he knew she meant well. The folk of the Pale had a slightly differing sense of honour and courage than the plainsfolk of Whiterun: to Tolal, the simple fact he didn't break under the Thalmor's torture proved his courage, because he'd endured the worst life had thrown at him. Thorald could appreciate that but on the plains, he needed to wreak a bloody revenge to prove himself. Or at least keep an oath to the mer who healed him.

"I can do this," insisted Thorald, meeting her striking Norc eyes. "I will not be an oathbreaker."

"Plainsmen," the Dragonborn muttered under her breath, earning a wry grin from Thorald. Yes, she had little under-tusks that were more like overdeveloped eye-teeth than anything else and precious little white in her eyes, but she was a Nord through and through.

"I must do this, Dragonborn," he told her roughly. "I… must."

"Fine," Tolal grudgingly growled. "But if a dragon shows up, I'm letting him eat you."

Thorald surprised them both with a full, throaty belly-laugh that made him wince afterwards with the pain. "If he chokes on me, Dragonborn, that will be a good death because it will give you time to kill him," he said with a pained grin.

She shook her head bemusedly and turned her attention to the carcass of the strange deer she'd brought down with her throwing axe. "Call fire. We need to eat something and maybe take a break. You want to eat too, Gelebor?"

The snow elf, who'd managed to travel through enchanted mirrors to each Wayshrine and perform a ritual that he said would strengthen Auri-El's influence, paused and then nodded slowly. "It has been thousands of years since I had the luxury of sitting down and sharing a meal," he finally agreed, loneliness filling his voice.

Thorald found himself pitying the mer and wondering if the snow elves had been as evil as legend made out. Why had they descended upon Saarthal during the Night of Tears? He pondered this as he set up the fire and started it, turning a shield they'd scavenged from a long-dead adventurer nearby into a griddle to fry the venison in its own fat.

There were familiar herbs in the valley and soon Tolal was cooking the neatly butchered deer in fat and sweet blue mountain flowers with a bit of wheat from her pack. "It will strengthen you a little," she told Thorald. "Not quite as strong as a healing potion but every bit helps."

"Thank you, Dragonborn," he said gratefully.

"You're welcome." She dished up the fried venison in three portions on dried hardtack from her pack. Thorald, ravenous from his healing, devoured his meal and discovered that it was rather delicious. Gelebor ate his more slowly, obviously savouring it, as Tolal alternated bites of venison with brewing up the rest of the wheat and blue mountain flowers into proper potions with snow melted over the fire.

_It's strange that the best practitioner of the Clever Craft I should meet is a Norc from Half-Moon Hold who speaks like a Paleswoman,_ he mused as his stomach protested at being full. He knew very little of the Dragonborn; in fact, he thought the hero of legend was a Redguard from what his superiors said. But that Shout of hers had saved both their lives at Northwatch Keep…

"Tolal, forgive me the blunt question, but…" Thorald tried to find the words and finally settled on being honest. "I thought the Dragonborn was a Redguard."

"Akatosh apparently wants Alduin dead so badly that he made two of us," Tolal answered with a sigh as she pounded herbs into a paste with her mortar and pestle. "There's me and from what the Harbinger told me, the other guy's my paternal uncle. He's… also kinda an arsehole, I hear."

That explained the olive-bronze cast to her skin. "Um," Thorald began, trying to find a tactful way to ask her about her background, when she smiled ruefully and beat him to the punch.

"I was born in Bruma of an arranged marriage between Rustem, the eldest son of the last Blades Grand Master, and Sigdrifa Stormsword, the shieldmaiden sister of Hrafn the Foe-Reaper," she explained gently. "I was orphaned in the massacre in the Great Chapel of Talos and found by a Nord Legionnaire named Dag. That's how I wound up in Dawnstar as a fisherwoman, because he and Adelheide raised me."

"Thank you, Dragonborn," Thorald said gratefully. He knew of the fisherman she was referring to; Ulfric had lamented that Dag Foam-Breaker hadn't joined the fight against the Stormcloaks because none knew naval warfare like he did. But the man had done something far more important for Skyrim: he had saved and raised Alduin's Bane.

"Just Tolal." The Norc woman poured the last of the syrupy healing potion into a small bone vial. "I only learned of my Half-Moon kindred but I'm now recognised as an adult under Malacath's Code and considered a wisewoman. It means random idiot Orcs won't try to marry me because I'll fry their arses off."

He had the feeling it meant more than that but Gelebor chuckled at her wry statement. "I apologise for diverting you, Tolal, but…"

"I'm irritated but I managed to send a message off to Esbern at Sky Haven Temple while Thorald was doing the ewer thing." Tolal had been emphatic on the Nord carrying the progressively heavier Initiate's Ewer since he was insisting on being a true Nord at this very moment. She probably didn't understand how much Thorald appreciated her letting him do it. "So he knows I'm alive."

_She may complain about it but she understands I must do this,_ he thought, accepting two of the vials she handed to him. If any of his Stormcloak brothers doubted her status as a true Nord, he would kill them for insulting her.

Eventually she rolled over and went to sleep, leaving Gelebor and Thorald staring at each other. "The burdens of mortality weigh heavy upon you," the mer said gently.

"I was tortured by Thalmor," Thorald answered tersely. He had no wish to discuss what had happened in Northwatch Keep, knowing that he got off lightly compared to others because they wanted an 'asset' inside Jorrvaskr.

"And yet unlike other Nords, you do not blindly lash out at every mer because one did you great wrongs," Gelebor murmured approvingly. "I… will not claim that Ysgramor's actions were unprovoked by my people but Vyrthur once told me that the decision to attack Saarthal had been reached under great reluctance and only because of some weapon the Nords had found or developed."

Thorald, who'd been told something of what happened at Winterhold by Tolal, nodded slowly. "I'd say it was what Tolal called the Eye of Magnus," he answered quietly. "A Thalmor nearly destroyed the world with it, she said, until the Psijic Order intervened."

Gelebor nodded, lips tight and grim. "My order had connections to the monks of Artaeum. They follow the Old Ways but are… disconnected from the world."

_Sounds like the Greybeards._ "One is an advisor at Sky Haven Temple, Tolal said."

"Interesting. If the Psijic Order is reaching out beyond Artaeum, it means great things are beginning." Gelebor sighed, raking a hand through his short white hair. "When you relinquish that ewer, Thorald, you may have the option to relinquish your burdens of mortality too. I do not know if Auri-El will allow a man to ascend, but you will have earned the right to leave your mortal shell behind in perfect peace and rejoin the Aedra in the stars."

"'Cattle die, kindred die, every man is mortal'," Thorald immediately replied, quoting from the oldest of the Atmoran sagas, said to be written by Yngol himself. "'But the good name never dies of one who has done well'."

"Words anyone – man and mer – would do well to live by," Gelebor agreed softly. "I have… never exchanged more than the bare necessity of words with a Nord. Those of your people who have stumbled across the Forgotten Vale generally only agreed to help me because of the Bow of Auri-El and the chance for treasure, not because they felt they owed me a debt."

"Getting someone to kill your brother…" Thorald began slowly. "Kinslaying is a bad business."

Gelebor's expression was sad. "I wish it were otherwise. But he has become a monster, an affront to Auri-El, and if I fall trying to kill him, the world will be troubled by a creature equal to Alduin in depravity because none could hold him."

Thorald couldn't fault that. It was common knowledge in the Grey-Mane family that some Companions were werewolves, sworn to Hircine and to protect Jorrvaskr with the strength of the pack, but if one of the Circle became feral, it would fall to the Grey-Manes to hunt them down. Avulstein had been trained for that duty before… everything happened. But with now only the Harbinger and Aela werewolves (and under an oath to only recruit those who could handle the blood _and_ were fully aware of what they'd be doing in the afterlife), Farkas and Vilkas were taking over many of the Grey-Manes' traditional duties. Once, Thorald had thought freeing Skyrim more important than following his father to the forge as Avulstein followed Uncle Vignar to the Circle.

Now, looking down at his trembling limbs and skinny frame, he might not even be good enough to serve mead in Jorrvaskr, let alone work the Skyforge.

"You should rest," Gelebor advised as he rose to his feet smoothly. "Tomorrow will be hard."

Thorald nodded absently, looking over at the Dragonborn as she slumbered. She thought him strong enough to carry his own burden even if she kept on telling him he could rest if he wanted.

_Without thought, she reached out to save me,_ he mused as Gelebor used the magical mirror to return to the first Wayshrine he'd guarded for millennia. _I owe her a powerful debt._

Mortality was a burden indeed but Thorald would not – _could_ not – die with so heavy a debt on his soul. From the sounds of it, the other Dragonborn was a dangerous enemy and Tolal, while a good woman and competent huntress, could be in peril if this Redguard decided that only one should have the honour of slaying Alduin.

Thorald, on the other hand, knew evil like the back of his hand. It had kidnapped him in Rorikstead, used fire and lightning to break him, made him watch the torture and worse of fellow Nords even as they called on Talos with pain-cracked voices. It had tortured people of all races, even those who didn't worship Talos, because it wanted to end the world in blood and despair.

He wouldn't let evil get its hands on this woman and not just because she was the world's last hope against Alduin. Sleep claimed him before he could ponder the full ramifications of why he felt that way.

…

"Thorald, take the fucking bow. You earned it."

Tolal had several cracked ribs, a sprained ankle and a gash across her forehead from cracking splinters of ice yet somehow Thorald, who'd managed to bring the _vampire_ Vyrthur down by throwing a bottle of mead in his face and following it up with a Flames spell, insisted she deserved the damn Bow of Auri-El.

The pureblood regarded her with those weary blue eyes before nodding slowly. "As you wish, Dragonborn. I'll forge you a weapon of legend instead."

Tolal's hand closed possessively over her orichalcum hand-axe, forged and enchanted by Aunty Lakhra back in Half-Moon Hold, and the man actually smiled a little. "Avulstein was to follow Uncle Vignar into the Companions… but I was to follow my father at the forge. I am no wondersmith, but I know the basics of forging and Atmoran enchantment."

Forgetting her injuries, Tolal sat up, jaw dropping in amazement. "You practice the Clever Craft-?"

Within a trice the mostly healed man was by her side, pushing her back down. "You should rest until Gelebor comes to heal you. But yes, I know a little of the Clever Craft of metal, stone and wood, just as you know the old hunting magics."

His hand was gentle against her skin but Tolal could feel every scrape and callus on it. She was intimately familiar with this hyper-sensitivity that regrettably increased her awareness of the pain; it had led to a few nights of sharing the bedroll with men like Brynjolf but never anything too long-term. Being a huntress and fisherwoman on the Sea of Ghosts had few prospects, even if she wasn't a Norc-

"I will come with you to Sky Haven Temple once I tell my family I'm alive," Thorald told her, answering the question which would have followed. "I… can't leave you, Tolal. This other Dragonborn worries me – if the Blades won't follow him-"

"How the hell did you know about Sky Haven Temple?" she asked incredulously.

"Everyone knows there's an old Akaviri Temple in the Reach," Thorald answered confusedly. "If the Blades are serving you, they would be there, obviously."

Tolal sighed, wincing in pain. Gelebor couldn't come soon enough because they'd drank the last health potions in the wake of fighting two fucking dragons at once on thin ice… literally. One good thing about the abundance of dead adventurers was that she'd managed to get an iron breastplate for Thorald to cover his rags and a bow for him to wield, which he was quite adept at.

"The Blades are pretty much dead. Esbern and some other woman are the last ones, but he's working with me to re-establish the Wizards' College in the Reach at the Temple and she's fucking around, causing trouble."

"Ah." Thorald sat down beside her as the mirror shimmered to life, bringing Gelebor through it. He regarded the ashen remains of his brother stonily as a single tear trickled down his cheek before turning to face the two men with a relieved expression.

"It's over. Thank you. May Auri-El bless you."

"You're welcome, Gelebor," Tolal answered as the mer placed his hands on her forehead to heal her. "But unless the Fal- the Betrayed can catch Sanguinis Vampirus, it wasn't them who turned your brother into a vampire, a blood-drinking servant of Molag Bal."

The magic flickered for a moment, shock crossing Gelebor's aquiline features, before he resumed the healing spell. "That explains his vile prophecy, one that will never come to pass now that Thorald and you have slain him, Dragonborn."

Tolal sighed. "Thorald did the deed, so the Bow's his."

"Indeed. That a Nord should be Auri-El's champion…" Gelebor shook his head in bemusement as Thorald blinked. "Still, better him than some others."

"It could be a cosmic balancing thing," Tolal said slowly as the pain eased. "Wuuthrad, the Storm's Tears and the axe of Ysgramor, is the greatest artefact of the Nords. Yet it's wielded by an Altmer Harbinger. Perhaps the Bow coming to Thorald's hands is the gods' way of balancing everything."

"There is a proper symmetry to it," Gelebor agreed thoughtfully. "As the last Knight-Paladin, I can offer one more service. Bring proper elven arrows to me and I can turn them into blessed arrows that rain fire on the corrupt and damned."

The mer's grey eyes glittered. "Once I have performed particular rites, the Thalmor will be amongst them."

Tolal couldn't fault Thorald his savage grin. It also highlighted how attractive he was.

_Great, I want sex and he probably doesn't,_ she thought mournfully – and then kicked herself for being so petty. He'd been tortured a few weeks ago and she was moaning because he wouldn't fuck her?

"Thanks," she said gruffly. "So, do you know the way out of here? We need to return to Sky Haven Temple."

Thorald gave her a startled glance and she raised an eyebrow. "I need to know what I'm walking into, Thorald. I know for a fact that Esbern regularly scries every Jarl's court when they have Holdthings."

"Of course. But if it's true that the Empire's been driven from Skyrim, I'll be able to visit my mother, tell her I'm alive…" Thorald's smile was weak but radiant. "Perhaps my father will let me work the Skyforge. You deserve nothing less than Skyforge Steel for saving me."

"If the Moot has the brains the gods gave gnats, they'll make Balgruuf High King with Ulfric dead," Tolal said bluntly. "Elisif's a damned child… and I already gave the Jarl of Whiterun the Jagged Crown. Stole it from Ulfric after he managed to get his hands on the Horn of Jurgen Windcaller and tried to manipulate me into joining the Stormcloaks."

Thorald actually blanched, no mean feat beneath the dirt and grime on his skin. "Ulfric… He should have known better than to meddle in the Greybeards' business. Balgruuf has his faults, but he _does_ honour the old ways…"

Then he narrowed his eyes at her. "You managed to burgle the Palace of Kings?"

She chuckled wryly. "I've guided many people across the northern ice, Thorald, and often traded skills with them if they were of a mind. I actually get on rather well with the Thieves' Guild – not honourable, per se, but it means I'm one of the few people who can walk through Riften without getting robbed. It also allowed me to track down old Esbern."

He sighed, looking a little disappointed, and it oddly hurt her. "You are still a true Nord," he murmured before he turned away to examine the Bow of Auri-El.

Tolal surprised herself with the flush of pleasure at his comment. The man had struggled beneath the weight of the Ewer she'd peevishly thrust upon him with little complaint, had managed to hold his own in the battles they faced, and was a wondersmith from one of the oldest, most honourable families in Skyrim. If Thorald wanted to come to the new College, he'd make an excellent addition, though she hoped he could deal with the inevitable Altmer…

"We'll go to Whiterun once things are sorted out at the Temple," she promised softly.

"Thank you," he answered quietly, looking over his shoulder. He was too skinny for a Grey-Mane – the Thalmor owed him every sun-bright arrow that he struck them with.

Tolal smiled at him tentatively and received a weak one in reply before he returned to examining his new weapon. Maybe things wouldn't be so bad after all.

Now she just had to kill Alduin. Somehow. Hopefully the Greybeards could help with that.


	6. The Ghost and the God

Note: Thanks for reading and reviewing! Trigger warning for violence. Massive amounts of HC for Talos. Blame Chamerion for the Talos shipping Tolal and Thorald.

…

**The Ghost and the God**

Sudrith of the Forebears had been in a lot of situations but waking up with the point of a quicksilver katana at his throat and a pair of enormous eyes like the seas in Sentinel's harbour staring down at him was a first. Volunteering to do some discreet questioning about the mages' College relocating to the Reach had led him to an isolated inn called the Old Hroldan Inn and now he was cornered in Tiber Septim's own bedchamber by a _very_ unhappy woman with a startling resemblance to Irkand ibn Farrah. Her compatriot, a tall (even by Nord standards) man with long, greasy hair that was too white for his relatively young face, had a brilliant golden arrow nocked to a bow that shone with elven magic.

"Irkand's niece, I presume?" he asked carefully.

"So I'm told," the woman growled with an Orcish woman's husky voice overlaid by a Nord accent. "I have a message for my fellow Dragonborn: get his arse to Sky Haven Temple. I have something he needs very badly and he has the Shout that can ground dragons."

_She's certainly direct,_ Sudrith thought wryly. He didn't get the same aura of palpable menace from Tolal bint Rustem that Irkand exuded and her eyes were utterly normal instead of slit like a dragon's. The Forebear didn't want to speculate on the meaning of that as he nodded curtly.

The woman stepped back, her friend keeping an arrow pointed at him. The pureblood Nord was too skinny and his clothing was little more than prisoner rags beneath an iron breastplate. But that bow was very fine indeed.

"Sorry for the rude awakening," Tolal apologised. "I've had a nervous few weeks."

Sudrith allowed himself a visible smirk. "Most of Skyrim thinks you're dead because you vanished when Northwatch Keep exploded," he noted dryly. "I believe a few people are going to be disappointed."

"Thorald and I took a detour," she answered cryptically. "I take it my uncle will be amongst the disappointed."

_Winds of Mowhra, what sort of reputation has Irkand built for himself?_ Sudrith wondered. He knew the man was deadlier than anything else alive but he'd spent thirty years searching for the woman who didn't seem that impressed by him, maybe even saw him as a threat.

"He'll be relieved and maybe even happy," Sudrith admitted, compelled to defend his leader. "He spent thirty years looking for you, even when rumours led into Thalmor traps."

Tolal nodded slowly, expression a mystery. "He's done himself no favours by pissing off my Jarl Balgruuf. If he is nithing – outcast – and oathbreaker, then technically I shouldn't be working with him as a Thane of Whiterun. I would advise him working on getting the bounty together _and_ an honourgeld, because he's going to need it."

"Balgruuf's agreed to work with him… but we need the name of a dragon trusted enough by Alduin to reveal the identity of a portal to Sovngarde," Sudrith confessed. "Balgruuf told him not to darken Dragonsreach's doorstep until he had it."

"I can get that but Irkand needs to get to Sky Haven Temple," Tolal growled. "He's abandoned his duties as Dragonborn for too damned long."

"His work with Ulfric Stormcloak kept the Thalmor off your back," Sudrith retorted, nettled by her simplistic Nord honour.

Tolal smiled, showing Orcish under-fangs, and it wasn't a pleasant expression. "I've killed nearly as many blackcoats as any Alik'r even before becoming Dragonborn, my Redguard friend. The fish and horkers of the Sea of Ghosts are fat with Altmer flesh."

"That explains the bad taste," her friend muttered under his breath. "Give me a fat haunch of Whiterun deer any day over horker steak."

"Remind me to avoid eating horker," Sudrith agreed aloud. "I… will carry the message to Irkand."

"Good. Esbern's got plenty to say to him and Delphine too. It should be interesting." The Norc woman nodded pleasantly and exited the inn room, her friend unnocking his bow and joining her.

Sudrith sighed in relief. Irkand was dangerous but also out of his element in Skyrim. Tolal… Well, this was her homeland, and he would hate to anger her. He would be advising his leader to meet with her in all due haste so they could be done with this northern wasteland and return home to Hammerfell.

…

Tolal's fingers traced the battered iron blade, scarred by time and use, and the still-visible etching of a double-bladed axe on a short hand that decorated the pommel. Once Talos had wielded this sword, according to the ghost at Old Hroldan Inn, the one who called her Hjalti Early-Beard. Talos' oldest name, known only amongst the Palesfolk, who descended from the men of Atmora.

Thorald touched the sword reverently. "Poor Gjuki to have never received his shield-brother's weapon," he said sadly. "It is the greatest way to seal a battle-bond: exchange weapons."

"He'll receive it from the hand of another Dragonborn," she murmured. "Poor bastard though. Maybe he can go to Sovngarde with this."

The Forsworn had kept it as a trophy, a way to mock the Nords who had conquered their homeland. Tolal and Thorald, who'd been assigned to the Reach Stormcloak camp to avoid trouble for the Grey-Manes, had made short work of them. She really needed to find him better clothing because those rags would arouse suspicion in the Reach guards.

"Eydis said something about having an old tunic and breeches belonging to her husband in a chest somewhere," Thorald suddenly said. "I can make do with the leather boots we scavenged from that dead adventurer in the Forgotten Vale."

"I'm sure she'll be willing to sell some clothing for a fair price," Tolal agreed as she looked towards the inn, populated by Eydis, her son Skuli and the Imperial who did the heavy work in return for shelter because he had some quarrel with his da near Markarth.

The innkeeper had a spare merchant's tunic and breeches in her clothing chest; not her husband's, it seemed, but a customer who'd run out on his meagre bill and left the garments behind. The tunic was practically a tent on Thorald and the breeches not much better, but he was no longer in rags and with the way he was gaining weight, he'd fill them out soon enough.

Gjuki smiled radiantly at Tolal as she handed the sword over. "I know you aren't Hjalti," he told her in that eerie voice. "I felt the power in you, like a sun, and thought… Ah, it doesn't matter. You are Dragonborn, you are Atmoran and you returned the sword promised to me. Thank you."

"Welcome," she said gruffly.

Gjuki jerked his chin towards the door. "Come, I will teach you some of what the sword-masters of Alcaire taught Hjalti and I in our youth."

With a bemused expression on her face, Tolal followed and Thorald joined her, eager for a lesson from one who had warred with Talos.

"Tell me of Hjalti Early-Beard, please," she asked once they were outside. "He's something of a legend in Skyrim, especially in the Pale, where I'm from."

Gjuki smiled in fond memory. "He was born in the Reach, his mother a Nord of this place and his father one of the last Atmorans to flee the icy doom of that land. We grew up together near here and went to Alcaire together to learn from Scathach the Red. When we returned, he went to the skalds for a year to learn the Voice – for he could read the dragonish script – and then we both went into service with King Culhecain."

The ghost spat in disgust. "Weasel-faced Colovian motherless son of the winter-dead! Refused us the sword-share from the battles we won for him until we gained Old Hrol'dan… Hjalti and I agreed to see red blood's due from his faithless heart after Old Hrol'dan, but a Reachman's arrow ended my life. Tell me, daughter of the Pale, did Hjalti claim his bloodgeld from Culhecain?"

"He did, choosing his time well," Tolal assured the ghost. "Culhecain stood before the Ruby Throne, but Talos Stormcrown was the one who took it, sacrificing Voice to see the King of Falkreath cut down and becoming an Emperor."

Thorald gave her a startled glance and Tolal smiled thinly, recalling what Esbern had told her. "Talos had the Amulet of Kings and the right to the Ruby Throne, but his oath to Culhecain forbade him from claiming what he'd earned. The Akaviri Dragonguard, one of my ancestors I'm told, solved the problem for him by executing Culhecain… and cutting Talos' throat when he said that he couldn't execute the assassin for being a Blade but couldn't be permitted to keep the Voice after that."

Gjuki's smile was a little sad. "That _would_ be like him. Did he reign long and well?"

It was Thorald who took up the story. "He united Tamriel as none had since the Cyrodiil Emperors and his descendants ruled for almost four centuries before the last gave his life to bind the Daedric Princes to Oblivion forever."

"That's… one way to put it," observed a hoarse male voice; Tolal spun around to see a stocky, broad-shouldered Reach Nord with iron-grey hair and a Stormcloak uniform limp into the clearing. "Hello, Gjuki. I'm sorry I kept you waiting for your sword."

"And so you should be!" the ghost snapped. "Took your damned time with Culhecain too!"

"As Scathach constantly told us, timing is everything," the… avatar, Tolal supposed, of Talos retorted dryly. His uniform was bloodied and it looked like he was injured somehow.

Thorald fell to his knees in awe, meeting the reality of the Divine for whom he'd been tortured by the Thalmor because he wouldn't forswear his worship, but Talos caught his shoulders and brought him to his feet. "A Grey-Mane never bowed to me in life and I'll be damned if they bow to me now," he told the stunned pureblood. "I heard every scream and prayer in that place, Thorald. I'm sorry it took me so long to get people there to help you. But you held where others broke. You have nothing to prove."

Tolal finally settled for nodding respectfully to the Aedra. Technically they were equals as Dragonborn. But she was still in awe at being in the god's presence.

"You look like shit," she finally said.

"The Thalmor have managed to do a good number on me," Talos admitted with a wince. "Titus Mede II could only do so much, poor bastard. He sacrificed his honour to buy the Empire enough time to breed a new generation of fighters to face the blackcoats."

"If he had called on the Nord reserves, my uncle Vignar says we could have pushed the Thalmor back into the sea," Thorald answered slowly.

Talos grimaced. "Perhaps. Even I don't know how it would have turned out. At least the Nords were smart enough to keep their worship of me discreet; it kept me alive…"

Tolal coughed awkwardly. "A Jarl started a rebellion. It ended with his death, the Emperor's death and Skyrim leaving the Empire. It's pretty much Cyrodiil, High Rock and a bit of Morrowind now and I hear the Redguards want to conquer it."

"Oh, for fuck's sake!" Talos sounded absolutely disgusted. "That chair isn't fucking worth it. Trust me, I know."

Gjuki was shaking his head. "Strange men, the Ra Gada," he noted.

"Be nice. My birth father was a Ra Gada. I think. He was Aurelii." Tolal felt compelled to defend her late sire.

"You are a Nord… Well, _Norc_. But you were raised by true Nords and the Norcs are honourable in their own right," Thorald told her. "Even if you did rob the Palace of the Kings to get the Horn of Jurgen Windcaller."

"Hey, if Ulfric hadn't taken it and the Jagged Crown from their respective resting places…" Tolal looked at a wryly amused Talos. "Ulfric Stormcloak. Tongue, big worshipper of you, started the rebellion that killed Titus Mede II."

The god lost his amused expression, eyes glittering. "I'll have a word with him in Sovngarde – if he even made it there – once you're done with Alduin," he said grimly. "Several words, I think. Maybe ending with him being tossed off the Whalebone Bridge."

Thorald, who'd been a Stormcloak, had the good grace to wince and Tolal touched his arm comfortingly. She wouldn't hug him after the last freak out but he seemed to not flinch when he touched her.

The former prisoner smiled briefly at her. "It's okay, Tolal. I'm not blind to Ulfric's faults."

"Quite the name you have there. It means 'honey'," Talos said musingly. "I would have called you 'Tolal-Em', which means Honeybee – you seem like a sweet lady but with a wicked sting."

Tolal smiled at the god. "I'm a hunter who's killed a lot of Thalmor because they were trying to kill me."

"The Thalmor…" Talos sighed, shaking his head. "Once, they were the Altmer equivalent of the Stormcloaks. And now they've lost their way because I unleashed the Numidium on them."

"I think some of them would always be arseholes," Tolal noted slowly.

"Perhaps. But I made a rod for the world's back by uniting everyone forcibly – Oh, for fuck's sake, Gjuki, don't look at me like that. It was either me or Culhecain as Emperor!"

The ghost snorted unrepentantly. "Scathach always taught us that abandoning honour would kill us in the end."

"I know. And she was right." Talos' expression was bleak. "I came here to warn Tolal of the mistakes I made, so that she didn't walk in my footsteps."

"I have no desire to rule," Tolal said slowly.

"Trollshit. You're Dragonborn. The urge to conquer and dominate is in your blood-"

"I'm also part-fucking-Orc with a tendency to go berserk but most of the time I don't do that," the Norc interrupted dryly. "Most dragons, according to my friend Tey, only get into pissing matches when others enter their territory. Sky Haven Temple's my home, my… strunmah. The rest of Skyrim – the rest of Tamriel – can get along without me once Alduin's dead."

Talos stared at her, stunned as Thorald had been when brought to his feet by the god. "How do you fight it?" he asked in awe.

"I was a fisherwoman and hunter out of Dawnstar before this shit went down," Tolal answered calmly. "To me, luxury is a roof that doesn't leak and a bed that doesn't rock. I'm a Thane and I see the shit Balgruuf the Greater deals with on a daily basis. He can damned well have that crap. It's one of the reasons I didn't marry him despite us getting along pretty well in and out of bed, but I could hardly tell the poor man that."

Thorald blinked. "You and… the Jarl of Whiterun…?"

"Yes, Thorald." Tolal regarded him with hooded eyes. "I'm not married, he's a widower, and we're both consenting adults. I know I look like Malacath's little toe, but I don't crack mirrors, and I've had great sex with a few men. Got a problem with that?"

The Grey-Mane flushed. "No. I always thought the Jarl preferred summer flowers. His mistress Marie was a delicate Breton woman and the late Lady Svanhild was a tall, very fair woman."

Talos and Gjuki exchanged wry glances. "You're digging the hole deeper, lad," the god drawled in amusement.

"I don't give a fuck if Thorald has a problem with me having a healthy love life," Tolal said flatly. She… didn't. But it still hurt. He might admire her as a Nord and Dragonborn, but he didn't seem to think her the type to attract a Jarl.

"You could have fucked half of Skyrim for all I care. I just thought you would have had better taste than Balgruuf!" Thorald snarled in reply.

"The man happens to be very good with his tongue," Tolal retorted. "It was a one-off thing and he probably only proposed to me because I'm Hrafn Half-Moon's niece and Whiterun needs the alliance with the Norcs. I turned him down because I make a better Thane than a Jarl's wife."

"Find a godar and get married," Gjuki advised as Talos just watched and grinned. "It will stop the jealousy."

An awkward silence ensued before she said, "You're shitting me. I met the man about a moon ago."

"I married my first wife three weeks after I met her," Talos supplied helpfully. "Of course, it was arranged and all, but we got on well enough."

"Only way you could have gotten a woman," Gjuki muttered to Talos. They were like brothers always nagging each other.

"I'll have you know I simultaneously had a Dunmer mistress – from their royal family no less – and an Altmer concubine while married to Lavinia," Talos retorted. "All three ladies got on rather well. Ralinde actually cried when Lavinia died."

"You always had a mer fetish," Gjuki growled.

Tolal and Thorald exchanged glances. _Now_ the conversation had turned awkward. Everyone knew about Barenziah, though the die-hard Talos worshippers thought it propaganda or even blasphemy, but Tolal only knew about Ralinde through her daughter Celende's claims. She was tempted to tell Heimskr just to see his expression.

"From the little I understand, Ralinde was some Aurelii companion, a half-Akaviri Altmer," Tolal explained carefully to the gobsmacked Grey-Mane. "She was Harbinger Celende's mother."

"I always approved of her and Esbern," Talos said slowly. "It broke my heart that the Great War ended them."

"An Altmer Harbinger?" Gjuki asked incredulously.

"She earned the right and is as much of Jorrvaskr as any of the Nord Companions," Thorald said defensively. "I am not certain, but I believe she will relinquish the title of Harbinger when the Thalmor are permanently defeated, because she will be a leader in the next Great War."

"She's fucked in the head and it will get people killed," Tolal said grimly. "But it's the Companions' problem, not mine."

"I suppose you're right. They've always been truer to Shor than me." It seemed the god didn't know about the Circle's allegiance to Hircine. "Tolal… Even if you don't want to rule, you'll be forced into a position of leadership. There's… ripples… in the cosmos. Something dark is stirring, something as bad as Alduin. People will look to the Dragonborn for guidance… and at the moment, Irkand is more useless than Gjuki at cooking."

"You're shitting me. First I had to try and stop some crazy-arse blackcoat from ending the world, now I have to stop Alduin, and you're saying someone else is lining up to feast at the apocalypse table?" Tolal snarled.

Talos shrugged helplessly. "I don't know more than that. Akatosh created two Dragonborn and he hasn't done that since the Dragon War. Despite what Alduin thinks, he's not the be-all and end-all of Nirn. Something big is coming and you'll need to be ready for it." He glanced pointedly at Thorald. "And you'll need to be strong enough to stand by her if you love her."

_We only met a moon ago!_ Tolal thought at the god, but his expression didn't change a hair. Malacath seemed more powerful than Talos and a good deal more direct.

"I survived the Thalmor. I think I can survive whatever is thrown at me… at us," Thorald answered quietly.

"Good man! Whiterun men like their soft lives too much, but they're always there when it counts," Gjuki approved. "And folk from the Pale can handle storms that would bury even _you_, Hjalti. I think they'll be fine after they get married."

The god nodded, grimacing as the sun sank into the west. "I need to return to Aetherius," he grunted. "Gjuki, you coming? You can meet Ralinde. She was the only one who wanted to join me after I died."

_"My mother's with Talos in the stars,"_ Celende had once said, a child's yearning prayer. Tolal could tell the Altmer woman she was correct. It might help her a little.

"Can she cook?" Gjuki asked. "That's one thing neither of us could do."

"You don't need to eat, Gjuki."

"Like hell I don't. Eydis gave me some good mead. Shame I'm dead, she'd make a good wife."

The duo faded into the gathering dusk, leaving the two alone. Tolal found herself a little pissed off Gjuki hadn't taught her the tricks of the Alcaire sword-masters.

"I thought he'd be taller," Thorald finally said. "But he's about the size of an Imperial."

Tolal shook her head. "We should get some rest. We need to hotfoot it to Sky Haven Temple on the morrow."

"Yeah…" Thorald looked at her, his eyes piercing blue even in the rapidly darkening sky. "Tolal?"

"Yeah?"

"If Balgruuf valued you only for your connections to Half-Moon Hold and you being Dragonborn when he proposed to you, he was a fool."

She wouldn't blush like a Riften flower girl at one of Brynjolf's compliments. She wouldn't blush… Oh hell, she was blushing. Thank the other eight Divines – not the one trying to matchmake her – that Thorald couldn't see.


	7. Drem Yol Lok

Note: Thanks for reading and reviewing! Trigger for psychological issues. Blame Chamerion for Tey the psychotherapist.

…

**Drem Yol Lok**

"Drem Yol Lok, Dovahkiinne."

"Drem Yol Lok," the tall, black-haired Norc woman before Irkand echoed, Voice warm and slow and sticky as honey for the carthorse-sized dragon before them. There was trust and friendship in her body language whenever she glanced at the tiny cream-scaled creature, turquoise eyes like the summer seas of Alinor in her gaze.

But when he paused in uttering the traditional draconic invocation of peace, the eyes became the cold sea-green of the ice floes that riddled the Sea of Ghosts, her lips peeling back slightly to reveal overdeveloped eye-teeth and her body rigid with the need to attack and defend.

Irkand was one of the deadliest Blades ever trained by an organisation dedicated to covert warfare. He was a weapon honed to wind-wounding sharpness by grief and war, as fast and searing as the Blade-Wind of the Alik'r Desert that could flense flesh from bone at its height. He was a Saint of the Sword, a Dragonborn, executioner of the Blades and commander of the Alik'r. His eyes glowed with draconic fury and while he was frightened of facing Alduin, he had mastered himself against the lesser creatures like the ridiculously small dragon before him. Furthermore, he had something that was wanted and needed by this northern huntress.

Yet this tall, athletic woman in fine fur-trimmed armour studded with orichalcum, a huntress reputed to be only barely adequate with the katana she wielded and preferring a crude throwing axe of orichalcum, knew that she had something he needed and wanted to escape this wretched craggy shithole of a sun-forsaken land. This was her home, her… strunmah, and she was _very_ unhappy with Irkand.

"Drem Yol Lok," he uttered tightly under the weight of those Norc eyes. Tolal Dragon-Born remained outwardly human, Sudrith commenting that she seemed in full control of her draconic nature and adding he would hate to meet her in the snowy wastes she called home. She had put the deathblow to the Thalmor in Skyrim and was recognised as a Thane in Whiterun by the Jarl whose palace he needed to trap a liegecreature of Alduin's.

She damned well knew that the cards were in her hand when she ordered him to Sky Haven Temple.

Tension eased out from both Tolal and Tey, who wouldn't give Irkand his full name lest the Ra Gada Dragonborn summon him for the slaughter as Delphine urged, and the former sat down on a fur pallet. Irkand, accompanied by Tammas, followed suit and studied this niece of his who was a far cry from little 'Lia, the only person who'd never judged the Third Blade.

Esbern, still alive after all these years, sat down beside Tolal, his body language proclaiming him the First Blade to her Grand Master. Delphine was next to Irkand, posture stiff with defiance. Where Tammas sat on his other side, a tall, white-haired Nord man with the expression of one who has endured much sat by Tolal.

"Ah-Kah-Niid. Hunter-Pride-No," Tolal growled. "They tell me you're my uncle."

"I am, Aurelia Minor," he replied, giving her Imperial name. She was his niece… but she was also a fellow dragon, one who was decidedly unamused by his presence.

He'd hoped to unsettle her but her expression remained calm. "You've killed a lot of damn people," she continued grimly. "Impoverished half a town. Pissed off my Jarl. Shattered the balance of power in Tamriel. And only because I disappeared for a few weeks you decided to actually do what Akatosh made you for. You're not even sorry for the chaos you've caused and that's the saddest thing of it all. Hi los aar wah hin dovah lund: 'You are a slave to your dragon nature'."

"Tolal…" Esbern sighed, shaking his head. "Irkand, Delphine and I went through things you can't even imagine-"

"Until I met you and found out who my birth parents were, I had no idea why the Thalmor did their best to kill me on sight when I wasn't even that devout a worshipper of Talos," the woman interrupted, though gently. "It got to the point where I started laying ambushes for them as soon as I saw the black and gold – or decided to remain on the boat and ice floes where they had no hope of reaching me."

"I am a killer and I make no pretence about it," Irkand admitted starkly. "It was what I was born and trained for-"

"To quote a Divine I met recently, 'Trollshit'," Tolal interrupted again, this time with far more heat than she'd showed to Esbern, who was obviously a trusted advisor. At the use of the obscenity, the white-haired Nord coughed awkwardly. Irkand still didn't know his name, but he assumed it was some kind of huscarl or bodyguard by the way he hovered over her – yet the man was skinny and scarred as hell. "I'm a Norc who was raised by pureblood Nords. According to theory, I should go berserk at the drop of a hat and kill everything in sight, down to the rocks and shrubbery. I don't. Because I'm more than that… and so should you be."

"Thank you, Tolal, for perpetuating the common view that Norcs are rampaging berserkers who like winter," observed a lanky Norc in fine silk from the outer circle sarcastically.

"Arakh?" Tolal countered dryly.

"…Fair enough."

"For fuck's sake, get off your high horse," Delphine retorted, eyeing Tolal. "So you had to kill a few Thalmor because of who your parents were. Esbern, Irkand and I lost _everyone_ we cared for at Cloud Ruler Temple. Irkand killed most of the Thalmor in Skyrim to protect _you_ and you've got the brass tits to judge him?"

"You know, as a tracker, you make a good innkeeper," Tolal countered mildly. "Be grateful Oleg and I killed all the frost trolls for you."

"Tolal, we don't need a pissing match between you and Irkand's girlfriend," advised the white-haired Nord. His accent was thick, like most Nords, but well-enunciated. He came from good blood – or what passed for it up here.

"I'm not his girlfriend," Delphine said icily. "I'm his second."

"Actually, that's Sudrith," Tammas corrected tersely. The remnants of the Alik'r weren't amused by Delphine's attempts to usurp Sudrith's position. "The Alik'r who carried the message for you, Tolal."

"Can we please not get side-tracked?" Irkand snapped. "I have the Shout that grounds dragons. You have the name of one of Alduin's lieutenants. We both have to go to Sovngarde and kill Alduin. What more needs to be discussed?"

"When you work on a fishing boat with someone else, trust is vitally important," Tolal answered slowly, hurt flashing in her eyes. "I need to know you'll have my back no matter what, Irkand, because Talos Himself described you as 'useless'. I don't know how you're regarded in Hammerfell, but in Skyrim you have the reputation of a nithing, an oathbreaker and a murderer to the common churl, no matter who you've slain. Some Stormcloaks, I hear, blame you for Ulfric's death and never mind the fact that Titus Mede II also died. To them, the Jarl of Windhelm was the second coming of Talos, and he died because you took him along to kill an old man who'd tried to do his best."

Irkand slowly looked around, seeing others in the outer circle – Oleg the Norc, a male Nord in mage-robes accompanied by a Dunmer woman with the marks of Telvanni breeding, an Orc wearing glasses of all damned thing – nodding in agreement with Tolal's words. "Nords deal in honour, Alik'r deal in results," he answered harshly. "When I say I kill something, I kill it. Is that enough for you?"

"Do not try to reason with him, Tolal," advised the dragon gently. "He is a Bruniik – an Akaviri savage – with a dragon's soul. A savage beast who can act as a man. "Daal-Feyn is not much better – even her own god has turned his eyes from her."

"This from something who comes from a race that enslaved humanity in the Merethic Era," Delphine retorted flatly.

"Kaan approached me to persuade Paarthunax to teach the joorre the Thu'um," Tey replied calmly. "What is better - to be born good, or to overcome your evil nature through great effort?"

Irkand flinched as he recalled his father Arius posing a similar question to him and Rustem as children. "The Divines rejoice more in one sinner saved than ninety-nine righteous men come to them in death," he answered softly, remembering the Grand Master's reply.

"Tolal-Em-Ah – Honey-Bee-Hunter – understands this instinctively. She follows the Way of the Voice, Speaking only in True Need. What she does with the strength of her arm and will is not the concern of the Divines, for did not they raise Talos to join them despite his many bloody and cruel deeds? You do not Speak often, Ah-Kah-Niid, but you are very much a dovah who is in danger of being lost to his nature, little better than Alduin."

"But the Greybeards are too isolated," Esbern argued, obviously picking up the thread of an old debate between the duo. "They have extraordinary power and could have ended the Civil War… even destroyed the Thalmor in the Great War!"

"And the Thalmor were once the Altmer Stormcloaks, born in the wake of Talos conquering them with the Numidium," the white-haired Nord retorted. "The Thu'um is too sacred to use wantonly. 'Speak only in True Need' is pretty obvious, Esbern."

"Humanity was in true need," the old loremaster pointed out wryly. "If we'd had a dozen Ulfrics…"

"We can talk about this until the horkers come home," Tolal said impatiently. "Irkand's right and I'm just dragging crap out for stupid reasons. The name you're looking for is Odahviing."

"You are… right as well," Irkand admitted, his voice raw. "But I don't have the luxury of sitting around on some mountain listening to some old Nord man drone at me. I can do that back home in Hammerfell with better tea and access to the Ansei texts to guide me. As you say, Tolal, let us be done with it. The Shout you wish to know is Dragonrend: 'JOOR ZAH FRUL'."

"Mortal. Temporary. Finite." Tolal's voice was almost as raw as his as she shuddered. "When you Speak, Irkand, I hear the _hate_ in those words and it makes me shudder. You learn a Shout, you absorb its meaning into your soul. I'm… not sure I want those Words on my Tongue."

Tey's ice-blue eyes were compassionate as he regarded Tolal. "A Word is a Word, even in Dovahzul. How you Speak it matters much, Tolal-Em-Ah."

"Cattle die, kindred die, every man is mortal: but the good name never dies of one who has done well," the Nord, whose name Irkand _still_ didn't have, murmured cryptically.

Tolal, whose expression was now twisted in pain as she tried to internalise Words that were obviously the antithesis of her nature, nodded tightly as tears streamed down her face. It had been easy for Irkand to learn those Words, for he hated and feared Alduin as much as the first Tongues had. But to Tolal, dragons were only enemies if they attacked her; and he had the feeling that deep inside, she was still 'Lia, a big-eyed girl who couldn't hate if all the Daedric Princes lined up to make it so.

"Joor. Zah. Frul."

The Words erupted from her lips but instead of raw and screaming, a mortal's defiance in the face of immortality, the Shout was a simple acceptance of mortality and the ending that it brought for peace and renewal. He supposed that Tu'whacca would say it so.

The pain bled from Tolal's face as she sighed. "That was… I hate at times, but that was…"

She looked to the white-haired Nord gratefully. "Thanks, Thorald."

"You're welcome. Those words kept me strong when the Thalmor had me," he answered simply. "All men die, Tolal, but it is the legacy we leave that matters."

"I think I understand Nords now," Tammas murmured.

Irkand thought he did, maybe, a little. To the Ra Gada, life was a struggle worth living, competition and strength leaving the greatest mark upon the world. Life was red in blade and wine, glory nothing more than the postscript to the actions of one who made themselves strong enough to leave a mark that no wind could erase.

To the Nords, life was a struggle too, one that had to be endured because the hope for glory was fleeting much like their summers. But where the Ra Gada struggled against death like any other battle, Nords embraced the idea of dying gloriously, their only real fear dying alone and forgotten in the snow. _Everything dies, even dragons in the end,_ Irkand thought sombrely.

The huntress rose to her feet and offered her hand to Irkand. "I don't think we can be friends. Too many years between whatever I was to you and what I have become. But I think I can trust you on my boat."

Irkand stood and accepted her handshake. She might even be physically stronger than he and not just because of age; her hands were muscular and callused, a worker's hands. "Then let us put Alduin back where he belongs," he agreed. "After that, I'll bother Skyrim no more."

"Fine by me." For a moment, regret flashed in those big eyes before Tolal's features turned grim. "Rest well. We leave for Whiterun tomorrow."


	8. Understandings

Note: Thanks for reading and reviewing! Just blame Chamerion for the Thorald/Tolal ship.

…

**Understandings**

Evening had fallen over Sky Haven Temple, Tey retreating to the peak that sat behind the courtyard where the two Dragonborn had met, leaving Tolal alone with Thorald. Irkand had gone inside, accompanied by Delphine and Esbern, presumably to catch up. Or something. She wasn't quite sure how to deal with her uncle beyond wanting to kick him in the balls repeatedly for being a dick but she had to be polite until Alduin was stuffed back into whatever cosmic hole he'd crawled from. She also knew the guy was almost as screwed up as Celende from the Great War, so she couldn't dick-kick him.

"Was I too hard on him?" she asked of Thorald.

"You were both right and wrong," the Grey-Mane answered. Now properly dressed in a plain but fine woollen tunic and breeches with his hair and beard trimmed, he looked almost like the scion of a poor but honourable clan he was. He still ate like a horse every meal, finishing everyone's leftovers even after two servings, but he had taken up working out with Onmund and Oleg in the morning and working on the forge in the valley below in the afternoon, so much of that weight gain was muscle. For someone who claimed he wasn't half the wondersmith his father was, he was good enough to impress Urag, who'd given him unfettered access to the tomes on runecrafting. "You can't understand how experience can scar a man. I understand Irkand's hate very well, because I share it for the Thalmor."

"But you don't think every Altmer's a blackcoat," she pointed out.

"Because I know that there are Altmer who hate the Thalmor just as much as the Nords," he pointed out. "Quaranir, for instance."

"I get the impression that Quaranir's grandpa was the last bastion of the anti-Thalmor Altmer before he was assassinated," Tolal said sadly.

"Rynandor sounds like he'd have been a good man to have a drink with," Thorald agreed with a slight smile. "Even as a Stormcloak, I… never had the problems with the mer that so many had. The Altmer, aye, they were a problem. But the Dunmer had never done me wrong, Orsimer are fine allies to have and the Bosmer brothers in Whiterun taught me how to use a bow."

"If only Rolff Stone-Fist had half your brains," Tolal growled. "Any idiot knows that the Dunmer loathe the Altmer and vice versa, for instance."

"And mistreating the Dunmer and Argonians likely made Imperial agents of them," Thorald agreed. "Make no mistake, Tolal: I am glad to see the Empire gone from Skyrim. But I'm not going to kick out people who've lived here for generations just because they have pointy ears, fur or scales."

"Thank the Divines for that because I'd be the first to go," Tolal laughed.

Thorald laughed with her before falling sombre again. "I have known you just over a moon," he observed quietly, words falling like pebbles into a still pond.

_Dammit, Thorald-_ Tolal couldn't say the words aloud. Not when they both suffered from the same affliction: _eldingar ást_, the lightning love. Some Nords fell in love like the snow falling, gentle and inexorable, while others were a blizzard that buried them both deep. More were like Kaan's tears, sad and soft, or clouds scudding on a wind that promised rain but never gave. A few were storms, great and terrible, the sort that skalds wrote epics about that never ended well.

The lightning love was born in tumultuous times between those who had done great deeds for each other, attraction sparking into something greater that could become a conflagration to devour them both.

"_Eldingar ást_ lies between us," Thorald continued. "Or am I the only one struck by lightning, a broken burden of a man to trouble you when you least need it?"

"You did not break!" she growled.

"Only because you saved me."

"And who saved my arse when Vyrthur nearly turned me into a Norcicle?"

Thorald burst into a fit of unmanly giggles. "Norcicle. I like that one."

Tolal's mouth tugged to the side in a wry smile. "You're right though, dammit. We're both lightning-struck."

"You know, in the sagas, you're supposed to declare your undying love for me," Thorald quipped. "Not sound like you're suffering a bout of inconvenient flu."

"I'm _so_ sorry. Next time, I'll ask Oleg to write me up something more appropriate to the Poetic Edda."

"Pfft, don't worry. He'll write it up like you made an undying declaration of love anyway." Thorald smiled, the expression half-wry and half-tender. "I expected to marry some appropriate woman from Windhelm; there had been talk about me and Friga Shatter-Shield until she was murdered by the Butcher. I never wanted a passionate love, just something like the hearth-love my parents share. So you aren't the only one suffering from inconvenient flu."

Tolal reached up to brush some of that white hair from his face. "Flu's catching," she pointed out wryly. "I'm blaming you."

Thorald huffed a wry laugh and rested his forehead against hers. "Yes, dear."

She laughed with him and wondered if the lightning-love would be so bad after all.

…

Balgruuf buried his face in his hands after Tolal had finished her report, only Irileth's quick squeeze of comfort on his shoulder preventing him from openly weeping. Thorald Grey-Mane, who had slipped from brash youth to haunted man much in the same manner Ulfric had, had been terse in his account of the torture the Thalmor had put him through. But he had not broken. That was something Ulfric couldn't have claimed.

"You did well," the Jarl of Whiterun said as he raised his eyes to those of Tolal. He believed every word she spoke about meeting Talos and the last snow elf. The Dragonborn wasn't one to lie to boost her own prestige when the reality of her existence was enough. "You were right: you make a better Thane than a Jarl's wife."

"You have the Jagged Crown and the best claim to the High Kingship," Esbern, a man who claimed to be her magical advisor, said pitilessly. Something about him reminded Balgruuf of Delphine; the way he tied his belt and sheathed his long, blunt-pointed dagger. If he was a Blade like the exile had been, then he supposed that was it.

"I know. I only wanted to rule Whiterun in peace…" Balgruuf looked down at the crumpled piece of parchment delivered by courier from Solitude this morning. "Elisif has invoked the right of a childless widow to a husband from Torygg's bloodline. Hrongar will marry her because he's closer to her in age than I."

"That's your way of saying you don't want to deal with a grieving girl who might be a little featherheaded," Tolal answered bluntly.

Balgruuf allowed himself a deprecating quirk of the lips. "Or maybe I didn't want to make the girl suffer by marrying the gold-hungry Jarl who became High King by being the last one standing."

"Skyrim needs you as you are. We need greater ties to Morrowind and High Rock, and someone smart enough to manage the Redguards if they decide to conquer Cyrodiil. Talos knows that if Irkand lives long enough to be High King Sura's weapon…"

Balgruuf's hand curled into a fist at the mention of the nithing Dragonborn. "You should not have paid his bounty, Tolal."

"He is my uncle and I need him to help fight Odahviing and then Alduin," Tolal said grimly. "He's already promised to piss off back to Hammerfell once this is over."

"Good. Good…" Balgruuf allowed his hand to relax. Forced it, rather. He was surprised by how hurt he was over Tolal choosing Thorald instead of him. It was a good match and judging by the way he looked at her, the man adored her as she deserved. But he was arrogant enough to assume that even if they couldn't marry, he and Tolal would have a friendship with benefits. Mara apparently had other ideas.

_Or maybe she wants a man she can love unreservedly,_ his conscience reminded him mercilessly. _Be honest: you were as interested in her connections and status as Dragonborn as you were in her._

He really wished his conscience didn't sound like Arngeir.

"So, you and Thorald going to marry before or after Alduin is killed?" he asked casually. Too casually because the Grey-Mane was giving him the sort of hooded look that informed the Jarl that he knew about Tolal's one afternoon with him.

"Given that every hour we waste is one where Alduin snacks on the souls of heroes, it will be after," Tolal answered, completely oblivious to the silent gaze shared by the men.

"Good. That will let me arrange an appropriate wedding ceremony and bring a Priest of Mara from Riften-"

"Dawnstar," Tolal interrupted. "Bring my old friend Erandur from Dawnstar. Maybe a few heads will explode when they realise he's a Dunmer."

Balgruuf grunted sourly. While him becoming High King was a foregone conclusion, especially with Ralof Stormblade offering the allegiance of the Stormcloak Jarls on the understanding that he kept them independent of whoever took over the Empire, he knew that the former rebels also assumed they'd be his muscle. They were half-right, damn their eyes. But Balgruuf always kept a cache of gold in the cellar for a rainy day and so it was with… other things.

"I wouldn't be that lucky," he groused. "But it shall be as you request. When shall I expect the dragon menace to visit my city?"

"In two days. Celende wants to call in all the Companions for this one," Tolal answered, damn well knowing he referred to both Irkand and Odahviing.

"Good. I've readied the trap ever since Irkand came down here demanding the use of it." Balgruuf gritted his teeth as he recalled the worry he had for Tolal mingling with the anger her uncle roused with his arrogant nithing ways. It had taken that cache of gold in the cellar to purchase enough food to feed everyone for the winter.

"Thanks, my Jarl." Tolal sighed, looking over the wooden expanse of Dragonsreach. In the firelight, her skin was the hue of honey. She had been sweet when he tasted her. "Thorald, Esbern, can you go see how Celende's going? I get nervous if that woman doesn't have direct supervision."

Esbern frowned at Tolal. "That's my daughter you're talking about."

"I know. Talos, I _know_. You both remind me daily."

Balgruuf wasn't sure whether to offer Esbern his congratulations or his condolences on having Celende for a child. He admired and respected her as Harbinger but she was feral in a way that made him uneasy.

"My mother wants to meet you," Thorald added with a slight smile. "Something about 'Dragonborn or not, she better be good enough for my son'."

"No son's bride is ever good enough for a mother," Tolal pointed out wryly.

Thorald laughed and the two men left. Balgruuf noticed that Irileth had withdrawn a little to give him and Tolal privacy.

"It's the _eldingar ást_," she admitted with a sigh. "I saved him from the Thalmor and he saved me from the Falmer vampire who nearly turned me into a Norcicle."

Balgruuf snorted slightly at the description of a frozen Tolal. "I… understand. It's just…"

"If you were a Thane like me, it might have worked," Tolal finished with a somewhat sad smile. "Or maybe if I'd been raised as Aurelia Minor or whatever the fuck my parents called me as a kid. But I look at the shit you deal with and I don't want to put myself through that. Bad enough as a Thane. I also have duties to the College at Sky Haven Temple. Thorald, Esbern, Tey and I are going to reclaim the Clever Craft, the native magics of the Nords. It may very well prove the difference between victory and defeat… whoever we face."

Balgruuf leaned forward, gaze intent on his Thane, momentary heartache forgotten. "You don't trust the Alik'r."

"I believe that my uncle and his friends are sincere. I also believe that this High King Sura or his descendants may not settle for just Cyrodiil and High Rock," Tolal answered slowly. "Uncle Irkand may also have kids I don't know about. If the dragon's blood pops up again and they lack even his few scruples…"

The Jarl's lips pursed in understanding. Though not a fan of politics, Tolal had the perception of any hunter studying potential predator or prey. "You will prepare for what Skyrim may face."

"_Will_ face," she corrected. "Talos Himself something dark was stirring and that I might one day have to lead others against it. But I have command over my dovah nature; I am content with my strunmah in the Reach."

"Understood." Balgruuf lounged back in his chair, studying his most reliable Thane. Did the Stormcloaks think he didn't know about Vignar being tapped to replace him if Ulfric had taken his city? It had been part of the reason why he dispatched Tolal and Celende to rescue Thorald. "Your cousin Gorek contacted me about a Norc husband for Dagny. I told him that any man who married my daughter would be husband to the next Jarl of Whiterun."

"Oleg," she promptly said. "But make him earn it. I love my cousin but he's too damned smug and a bit of a dandy at times. Give Dagny the choice of a spouse when she's of age and if Oleg's half the man I think he is – and he's a good man by _anyone's_ standards – he'll prove himself worthy of your daughter."

Balgruuf's hands gestured like he was playing cat's cradle. He was, in a way, with all the alliances of friendship, battle-bond, fosterage and marriage he was weaving to hold Skyrim together with the Empire's fall. Tolal was a part of it, in her way, though he dared not tangle that cord too much. She was loyal to him – in her way – and blessedly unambitious, though for the best reasons of all.

"That is… a fair idea. I have a few other offers for her hand; I will let Dagny decide, within reason, and let the men earn her favour."

Tolal smirked. "You better hope she doesn't like women. Otherwise she might wind up marrying one of my female cousins."

The Jarl matched her smirk. "At absolutely worst, she can have a husband and a lovely lady on the side. I will not hold my daughter to a higher standard than I do myself."

Her turquoise eyes shone with regret for a moment. "You're a good man, Balgruuf, and in another life I would have been glad to be your wife."

It eased him a little to know the regret wasn't one-sided after all. "You are my Thane, Tolal, and the bond of loyalty goes both ways. If Thorald Grey-Mane does wrong by you, I'll mount his head on my wall."

"Thanks, my Jarl." Tolal sighed and looked at the double-doors. "I should go and meet the folks."

Vignar, damn his Stormcloak eyes, would likely be an arse to her because she was a Norc. But Balgruuf suspected that Eorlund and Fralia would approve of Tolal and not just because she was Dragonborn. The Grey-Manes had married Norcs before, the last Vignar's grandmother, bringing her Norc husband to Whiterun and lending a swarthy cast to the line that cropped up in the old Companion.

"You'll be fine," Balgruuf assured her with a grin. Tolal regarded him wryly before nodding and leaving the Great Hall. As the double doors closed behind her, the Jarl allowed himself to mourn a little that it wasn't another life before putting the feeling aside. There was much to be done for destiny would be made in two days' time.


	9. Summer's Seeds

Note: Thanks for reading and reviewing! Trigger warning for fantastic racism and discussion of torture. Also, I can't see the Companions taking Vignar's deal with Ulfric to become Jarl if the Stormcloaks take Whiterun well.

…

**Summer's Seeds**

"You're marrying a bloody Norc woman?!"

Vignar Grey-Mane was nearing his eighties but he was still an upright, straight-shouldered man with a leonine mane of white hair and a Legate's shout that could be heard from one end of Whiterun to the other. Or from the comfortable annex to Jorrvaskr he slept in to the Skyforge where his younger brother Eorlund, son of his parents' old age, was sharpening the Companions' weapons in preparation for the trapping of a dragon in two days' time. Celende was a tolerant Harbinger when all was said and done, even if she took to the beast blood far more than she ought to, so the worst Vignar would face was a telling-off. Kodlak would have kicked him around the sparring ground, elder member of the Circle or not.

Avulstein, reluctantly mending leather straps on everyone's armour at the workbench because every hand was needed with Thorald probably in no condition to work, grunted in something that was half-amusement, half-agreement with his uncle. Norcish blood ran in their veins from a third daughter who married a man from Half-Moon Hold, now only noticeable in Vignar's skin-tone. But that had been a male, his tusks and turquoise eyes swallowed by the muscular build and grey-white hair of his bride, his only legacy a honing of an already gods-given gift for wondersmithing.

_She's Dragonborn, _Eorlund thought as he honed Vilkas' greatsword to a blue-keen edge. Skyforge Steel soaked in fire enchantments like parched earth did water, the primordial power of the ancient forge lending some of its fiery heart to the metal, but Vilkas was ever contrary and wanted an ice enchantment on his blade. Farkas, his brother, disdained enchantment and relied on his own awesome strength to dispatch enemies to Sovngarde.

Aela lightly ran up the stairs leading to the Skyforge, her eyes merry with wry amusement. The Huntress had won herself a mate in Celende, the broken Altmer girl brought to Jorrvaskr by Kodlak and Skjor, and vindication for her belief that Hircine was the rightful god of the Companions. Each of the Circle chose their own path but the scars that came from dividing their pack still lingered, deep and fine, in the relationships between the werewolves and the twins. Hopefully Avulstein could balance that out; no Grey-Mane took the beast blood, for it was to spit on the gift of smithing that Shor Himself gave them, and so the Circle always had one clear-eyed member. In theory, at least.

"It's a shame we didn't get to Tolal before the mages did," the huntress drawled as Eorlund finished up the greatsword. "Her knowledge of the hunters' Clever Craft is… amazing."

"You think that even when she's told the Harbinger – to her face, mind you – that she's fucked in the head and will get people killed?" Avulstein asked bluntly. He would do to learn that better to put some thought into his words – as Eorlund did – than open his mouth heedlessly and make a fool of himself.

"Celende is my wife and I have no illusions about her faults," Aela retorted. "Besides, if the Harbinger has a problem with her cousin, it's best they work it out between them instead of us meddling."

Eorlund sighed and turned his attention to Aela's dagger. It had taken him a while to understand the relationship between a Norc, a Redguard and an Altmer; trust the Imperials to complicate things. In Skyrim, children inherited the familial name of the parent who'd done the proposing in the marriage. Given that the higher-ranked person tended to do the proposing…

_You were lucky Fralia chose you over that merchant from Solitude,_ he thought. She could have had a wealthy life in Solitude, decked in the gold and gems she deserved, but chose to marry a poor smith from a clan that for all its honour was already in decline. Vignar had lately been making claims that the Grey-Manes would return to supremacy in Whiterun and Eorlund hated to think of how that would happen. Olfrid Battle-Born had an… arrangement… with the Thieves' Guild but the Grey-Manes tended to stay out of politics because of their allegiance to Jorrvaskr and the heirs of Ysgramor.

"You should remind my brother Companions stay out of politics," Eorlund said tersely to Aela. "Things may have settled down with Ulfric's death, Talos guide him home, but with Balgruuf becoming High King…"

"I'll have a word to Celende," Aela promised as the back doors slammed open, Vignar's irate voice following whoever exited.

"There are a half-dozen proper Nord girls who'd marry into the Grey-Mane clan!" his brother bellowed. "What's wrong with Nilsine Shatter-Shield or Hermir Strong-Heart?"

"If Avenicci's sources are right, the former's marrying Ralof Stormblade and the latter's marrying Gorek Half-Moon," Thorald retorted wearily. "What's wrong with Tolal? She saved me from the Thalmor! _We've_ got Half-Moon blood in us; what's wrong with adding a little more?"

"That was a son! Your children, my grandnieces and grandnephews, will have tusks and pointy ears!"

"Look, just because you didn't get to be made Jarl of Whiterun just like Ulfric promised you-"

Aela's eyes narrowed. "What?" She looked pointedly at Eorlund.

The wondersmith shrugged. "I knew he had some deal going with Ulfric but I work the Skyforge. I don't pay attention to politics unless I must."

Avulstein's lips were pursed. He should have been a whelp two years ago but first the civil war and then Thorald's disappearance prevented that from happening. "Uncle Vignar was doing what he thought was his duty," Eorlund's eldest son finally said slowly. "That it would have elevated our family was… a bonus."

The Huntress looked displeased. "Eorlund, the Circle will need to have… words… with Vignar. Depending on how he explains himself, you may need to make a bed ready for him in House Grey-Mane."

It would kill Vignar to be thrown out of the Companions. "Aela, for the years he has given… Give him the choice of retirement. It will let him keep his honour."

She nodded slowly, a little reluctantly. Aela the Huntress and Vignar had always been a little at odds. The Grey-Manes and the women of Hroti Blackblade's line tended to be. "I will make the suggestion to the Circle. We are politically neutral for a reason."

Oddly, Avulstein flushed with shame; Eorlund suspected he was the courier between his uncle and Ulfric. Just because the wondersmith was taciturn didn't mean he was imperceptive.

Thorald climbed up the stairs, steps springy with anger. Eorlund kept his eyes on the work at hand, not wanting to show a father's horror at knowing that the fine white lines which crisscrossed Thorald's forearms came from lightning spells or speculating on what left the faint scar that just missed his right eye or even how he'd lost an earlobe. According to Balgruuf, Thorald had remained unbroken under torture and so Eorlund owed his son the honour of not showing how much his heart broke.

His big brother gladly tossed aside the leather armour he repairing – Njada's from the look of it – and jumped to his feet. Eorlund finished off Aela's dagger as they embraced, pounding each other's backs as if nothing had happened. His son was home. Maybe he would even take up the hammer again, stay away from wars even though that was the only way to go to Sovngarde.

_Don't dishonour Thorald in such a manner,_ his conscience chided him. Sometimes the Nord and the father argued. No parent wanted to see their child buried before them.

"Welcome home, brother!" Avulstein said, far too heartily. "You're looking… well."

"I'm looking as good as a man who was tortured for two moons and rescued by the Dragonborn before getting into a fight with an eons-old Falmer vampire can," Thorald answered softly. "You should have seen me fresh out of Northwatch Keep."

Eorlund's fingers tightened around the whetstone. If he looked like he'd been aged a dozen years _now_, what had he looked like a moon ago?

"To hear Tolal Dragon-Born tell it, you saved her from said Falmer vampire," Aela observed warmly. "And picked up a rather nice bow."

Finally the wondersmith allowed himself to look up at his son. Thorald's hair and beard had been neatened, his fine wool tunic and breeches a little baggy on him but the white-scarred forearms he was showing surprisingly muscular. His eyes were shadowed – they always would be – yet he didn't look half as haggard as Eorlund feared. The bow and arrows on his back were golden and reeking of elven magic.

"The Bow of Auri-El," Thorald confirmed softly. "Tolal and Knight-Paladin Gelebor seem to think it's some kind of cosmic balance I was permitted to take the weapon: an Altmer wields Wuuthrad, greatest of the weapons of Men, and so I use the greatest weapon of the Mer."

Aela's eyebrow shot up at the respectful tone in Thorald's voice when he mentioned this Gelebor. "I would have thought after all you went through, you'd be aching to use goldskins as target practice."

"Blackcoats? Aye." Thorald gave a tight grin at Avulstein's jaw dropping. "That's what the Altmer themselves call the Thalmor. And remember, Celende is one. Anyone who's a foe of the Thalmor is a friend of mine."

The Huntress nodded approvingly and Eorlund realised that she'd been testing Thorald. "We could use a Grey-Mane whelp-"

"Avulstein still hasn't signed up?" Thorald interrupted quickly, eyeing his brother disappointedly.

"You're joining the Mages' College then." Eorlund's voice was more leaden than it should be. A Grey-Mane had worked the Skyforge since the Jorrvaskr came to shore here; Thorald was his heir as Avulstein was Vignar's.

"I intend to spend half my time there and half here," Thorald answered carefully. "Tolal and Esbern – he's the last Blades loremaster – want to reclaim the Clever Craft for the Nords. I'm… not the wondersmith you are, Father, but I know enough to be useful there. I've even learnt a few runes from the books in the Ysmir Collective and from Tolal that you don't know."

"Speaking of the woman you say you're in love with, where is she?" Eorlund asked, tone as careful.

"Meeting with Mother and Olfina." Thorald's mouth quirked to the side. "They chased me out."

The wondersmith picked up his small forging hammer and tossed it to a startled Thorald. "Forge something. Anything."

His voice was thicker than it should be as he took refuge in the role of master testing his apprentice to see if he was ready.

Thorald caught the hammer and nodded tightly. He went to the stacks of ingots and chose steel, four of the precious quicksilver ingots, and a length of firewood. "Aela, you've always dreamt of a Nordic bow and matching arrows like those your ancestress Red Annis slew a giant with, aye?"

"I have," the Huntress answered slowly.

"Then I will forge you a set and enchant the bow with some of the hunt-runes Tolal taught me."

His son turned to the Skyforge and began to work. Eorlund wasn't sure if he wanted his son to succeed or fail.

…

"You brought my Thorald back. I don't have the words to thank you."

Fralia _did_, of course, but she wanted to see how Tolal would respond to an old woman's gratitude. They and Olfina sat beside the fire in House Grey-Mane, hands curled around cups of lavender tea thick with honey. The men would no doubt be talking about honour and glory and all that rubbish while carefully not mentioning what happened to Thorald.

Tolal had properly brought a courting gift, a set of horker ivory cooking utensils she'd carved and enchanted herself. The knives would remain sharp and the food wash right off the spoons under running water; only Thanes and Jarls tended to have such luxuries and even then, only the wealthier ones. The Dragonborn who wanted to marry her son could make a comfortable living making such things in Solitude if she wanted to. Fralia had the feeling that the Norc woman wouldn't enjoy the greatest city in Skyrim very much.

"There is no debt between us," Tolal answered quietly. Her voice was very much like her name: slow and sweet, a bit growly from the Orc blood but not unpleasantly so. There was Redguard and Imperial blood in her, according to Harbinger Celende, that gave her a honey-bronze complexion and straight black hair. "Your son saved my life within a week of me saving his."

"Ah, the _eldingar ást_," Fralia observed gently. She had been struck with it herself on meeting Eorlund but it had taken her a while to convince the stubborn blacksmith he deserved her.

Tolal nodded wryly. "I compared it to flu, he told me it was contagious and so I blamed him for it. Then he said, 'Yes, dear' and we laughed."

Olfina coughed behind one hand, eyes twinkling. Fralia knew very well she was being courted by Jon Battle-Born but she was waiting for the boy to either take himself off to the Bards College and make something of himself or join the Companions to do the same. Her daughter was more than capable of taking care of herself – she'd have entered Jorrvaskr if not for Vignar's fit! – but Jon needed to prove himself strong enough to be her partner. No Nord woman wanted a milk-drinker for a husband just as she didn't want a brute.

"We could use the wealth a tie to Half-Moon Hold would bring us," Fralia admitted slowly. She believed Tolal would prefer frank speech.

"I don't know about wealth but I'm pretty sure I could talk Gorek into a discount on orichalcum and ebony for the Grey-Manes, if what Oleg told me is true," Tolal answered with a smile. "I can also sometimes bring dragon bone and dragon scale from dovahhe who are too stupid to live. Of course, I can provide leather; unless Skald and his cronies found my hidden caches, I have about fifty horker hides to hand."

The men would be going on about whether Tolal was good enough or not for Thorald. Fralia supposed that if Thorald had to marry, the Dragonborn was as good a match as any, and reports had her as a rather lovely woman unless you crossed her. "The hides would be welcome, but can you provide food?" Fralia asked starkly. "Those damned Alik'r blew up our milk cow."

Tolal's eyes turned sea-green ice. "I can and so help me, I'll take it out of my uncle's hide before he leaves for Hammerfell," she promised grimly.

Fralia's eyebrow shot up. "That…"

"Irkand is also Dragonborn," Tolal admitted with a grimace. "I have no idea why Akatosh chose the pair of us but his brother was my father, the son of the last Blades Grand Master married to a Norc Shieldmaiden of Talos."

The Grey-Mane matriarch sighed. "I don't want to seem horrid and I know you paid your uncle's bounty, but-"

"I'll clear out my caches up north – if you're not fussy about three moons-frozen horker – because I'm moving to the south anyway," Tolal promised. "As for an honourgeld, I can provide enchanted goods like the cooking utensils."

It sounded like Tolal was in a similar position to the Grey-Manes: goods-rich but coin-poor. They were lucky that Balgruuf allowed them to pay their taxes in goods and services, because Fralia heard Siddgeir of Falkreath and Elisif of Solitude insisted on cold coin. "We're in no position to be picky, I'm afraid. We've got potatoes a-plenty and the Jarl bought up every bit of grain he could after your kinsman came through, but Eorlund and the boys will never admit that they can't sustain their workload without meat."

"I know that feeling, though there were times when the grain and taters would have been a blessing to me. Horker meat gets a little old after a week or three," Tolal answered wryly. "After I return from Sovngarde, I'm hoping I'll have some time to set up a hothouse at the new Mages' College in the Reach. With the new harvest runes Urag found…"

Fralia and Olfina exchanged glances. "I'll admit to being a little uneasy about you and Thorald living at this College," the old woman confessed. "After what happened at Winterhold…"

"The College went digging in Saarthal, found the likely reason why the Night of Tears happened, a Thalmor got his hands on it and nearly ended the world," Tolal admitted flatly. "We lost all but one member of the senior faculty and three apprentices, including technically myself, and Winterhold's now a new harbour because of the intervention of the Psijic Order."

The Dragonborn looked down her hands. "Magic _exists_. It can no more be ignored than Kyne's winds or Shor's eyes in the sky. But the new College is going to have similar rules to the old Mages' Guild including political neutrality and I hope to make it the arcane equivalent of the Companions of Jorrvaskr. Practitioners of the Clever Craft came from Atmora too."

"I'm uneasy about magic outside of the Temples and the Clever Craft," Fralia told the young woman honestly. "They used magic to torture Thorald, didn't they?"

Tolal didn't insult Fralia by hesitating before nodding in confirmation. "I believe so. Probably a combination of Illusion and minor Destruction spells. Break a man down, keep him awake long enough, and he'll agree to anything. But Thorald told me that he'd relied on Yngol's 'Kinsmen' poem to keep himself going."

Fralia smiled in sorrowful pride. "That would be my boy. We Grey-Manes are a stubborn lot."

The Norc woman rolled her enormous eyes. "Yeah, I noticed that. When Northwatch Keep exploded, I had to use a Shout to keep us both alive, which landed us in an old snow elf holy place. Gelebor healed us up and asked us to put his vampire brother out of misery. I was going to do it myself but Thorald insisted on coming."

She smiled wryly. "Good thing he did. I'd have been a Norcicle. Your son threw our last bottle of mead in Vyrthur's face and then cast Flames."

Fralia nodded proudly, reminded of something Eorlund had once said about smithing steel. Adding too much to the sharpness of a blade made it brittle; every good Skyforge sword had a solid core that made it almost as flexible as the legendary katanas of the Blades. She noted that Tolal had hung up a sleek quicksilver-bladed one on the weapons' rack for guests alongside a well-forged orichalcum hand-axe that was balanced for throwing. Years of being married to the greatest smith in Skyrim had taught her to recognise the work of other great smiths: Lakhra of Half-Moon Hold had forged that Orcish hand-axe, no doubt as a gift for a daughter who'd returned to her family.

"Thorald is dented, his edge a little chipped, but he's good sword-steel," she finally said. "Sharp, strong and flexible. He's Eorlund's heir just as Avulstein is Vignar's."

"We intend to divide our time between the College and Whiterun," Tolal answered immediately.

"I know, child. But… there are things Thorald cannot teach, not even in this College of yours. Some knowledge must be kept for him – for the Grey-Manes. Eorlund might accept him teaching you – marry into the clan and you're one of us – but not the folks you'll have at the school. Or even your Half-Moon Hold kin."

Clan secrets like the forging of stalhrim and dragonbone. Eorlund had taken the Jagged Crown and turned it into a helmet for Balgruuf, forging atop the old magics in that ancient diadem. The Clever Craft of ice and steel and storm, forging two runes as one, the shaping of Skyforge Steel which wasn't as easy as everyone else assumed. The acceptance of the fact that Shor had granted the Grey-Manes to be the finest smiths in Skyrim without barely any effort, but their weapons must _always_ be forged for those who protected the home of the First Men.

If Tolal flinched or hesitated at Fralia's insistence, then Thorald's mother would refuse her blessing, which would mean the marriage could not go ahead. Thorald's heart would bleed, but all heart-wounds healed, and the clan would be safe.

But the Norc woman nodded slowly, expression thoughtful. "At the moment, I would vouch for anyone at the College – between Esbern being a sharp old coot and Tey having the ability to look back and forth on a person's wuldsetiid, they'd have a bloody hard time of concealing their motives. But now is not tomorrow and tomorrow is not next week. I understand and trust Thorald's judgment in what he wishes to teach – or not."

"Tey?"

"Teyfunvahzah – Tale-Told-True. A draconic bard and loremaster who-"

"Persuaded Paarthunax to teach the Thu'um to the first Tongues," Fralia finished with a slight smile. "It is said that he was Kyne's friend in the days before history."

"I believe that." Tolal smiled fondly. "He's one of my best friends."

"Then you have good ones." Fralia reached out to take Tolal's hand and give it a gentle squeeze. "You're not what Vignar wanted for his nephew but I think you'll do… kinswoman."

The Norc woman smiled suddenly; the expression revealed those delicate bottom eye-teeth but showed her innate warmth. "Thank you," she said simply as she glanced to Olfina.

Her daughter nodded in approval. "She'll do."

Tolal grinned at Olfina. "I'll have Oleg drop a few hints to Jon Battle-Born about getting off his arse and going to Solitude."

"I'd marry him now but Mother's insisting he make something of himself first," Olfina responded with a sigh.

"Nothing wrong with that. Have one person rely on the other spouse and you'll have someone like Elisif or that twit Siddgeir in Falkreath," Tolal answered. "Does Jon have bardic talent? If he can't leave for Solitude, Oleg's got enough rank to take him as an apprentice."

"It isn't that," Fralia repeated for the hundredth time. "I want Jon to show some initiative, not lay about the Bannered Mare all day while Mikael tried to seduce Carlotta and his brother goes around insulting the Grey-Manes. At this rate, I'd settle for Jon standing up and telling his family they're idiots. He should be honest about his intentions towards you, Olfina, for all the world to see. Jarl Balgruuf would stop the Battle-Borns from causing trouble and your uncle wouldn't dare cross me if I approved of the match."

Jon was a good boy but too much in the shadow of his family. He needed to grow some backbone, at the very least, even if he worked on the Battle-Born farm for the rest of his days.

"I'll tell him that," Olfina said, drinking her tea with too much haste. She'd always been a child of lightning compared to Avulstein's thunder and Thorald's rain.

Fralia looked at Tolal, who was too busy studying her cup of tea to make a comment. It seemed the Dragonborn had said her piece. Time would tell if it was tact, uncertainty or a desire to avoid meddling in other people's business.

"Will Thorald be joining you on the Great Porch when you confront Odahviing?" Fralia asked in the awkward silence that ensued.

Tolal raised her turquoise eyes, expression neutral. "I'll leave that for him to decide. The battle will end in Sovngarde… One way or another. That is a place he won't be able to follow me to."

Fralia nodded slowly. "Our fate lies in the hands of you and this Irkand."

"Akatosh has a strange sense of humour, doesn't he?" Tolal sighed and looked outside as the sky blazed red-gold with sunset. "At least tomorrow will be a good day to travel to Sovngarde."

She set aside the cup and looked directly at Fralia and Olfina. "Oleg knows how to recognise my caches. He can show Avulstein and Thorald how to find the meat and will probably be able to talk Gorek into recognising you as kin to Half-Moon Hold. That should tide you over winter until the summer comes."

"I think it would kill my boy to lose you," Fralia admitted quietly. This Norc woman might have the eyes and tusks of her Orcish ancestors but her heart was pure Nord.

"Thorald is stronger than he looks." Tolal smiled a little sadly. "My foster mother had a saying about winter winds and summer seeds."

Fralia nodded. "I have quoted the same one many times."

"Then when it seems darkest, should I fall, tell him that. For we are the children of Skyrim, and we fight all our lives, but when Sovngarde beckons…"

"Every one of us dies," Olfina finished breathily.

"Exactly. Sovngarde is beckoning and someone will die. It could be Alduin. It could be me. It could even be Irkand, though I wager Ysgramor would throw him out right-quick." Tolal's mouth quirked wryly to the side. "I plan for me returning in triumph. But I am a daughter of the Pale and we also prepare for the worst."

Fralia nodded once more, giving a bittersweet smile. Vignar was no doubt yelling about Tolal, but she'd do for her precious boy. "Others may call you Dragon-Born, Tolal… but to us, you are Tolal Grey-Mane. May the gods watch over your battles, daughter."

Someone had to… or they would all be devoured by Alduin in a futile effort to sate his dreadful hunger.


	10. When Sovngarde Beckons

Note: Thanks for reading and reviewing! Trigger warning for violence, PTSD and fantastic racism.

…

**When Sovngarde Beckons…**

"For we're the children of Skyrim and we fight all our lives…" Tolal sang softly as she carved runes into the wood and leather of the dragon trap, hunt runes to hold and bind Odahviing.

"And when Sovngarde beckons, every one of us dies," Thorald finished, etching more into the metal, angular lines that shone with the blue-keen edge of a sharpened Skyforge Steel blade.

Irkand waited below the pair, checking the flawless edge of his katana and ebony dagger meticulously. Just because he'd gained something of an understanding of the Nords' fatalistic endurance didn't mean he appreciated those two singing death-songs. He may have also hated that song because it reminded him of Ulfric, a man who died avenging his nation, and of Sigdrifa who died unarmed and stabbed in the back by a Thalmor.

Balgruuf, fully armed and armoured in Skyforge Steel plate that glinted with the same storm-blue highlights as the weapons the Companions wielded, watched the two add their finishing touches to the trap. The Jarl didn't wear his golden circlet set with rubies and emeralds; that rested on the head of his daughter Dagny, bundled into the cellar with Nelkir and Frothar and the other civilians. If he died today, his daughter would become Jarl and had the advisors to rule fairly well.

But the man who would become High King wore a hideous crown of jagged dragon's teeth and bone, the shimmering light of enchantment lingering in the edges and creases. The Jagged Crown, the Nords called it, and it was a treasure old and sacred as the axe Celende wielded.

Irkand didn't understand the man. Amongst the Ra Gada, it was not for the High King to fight directly unless he had no choice because he was the head of the army, the one who made decisions. Nord rulers had to be in the thick of combat to prove themselves, an idiotic notion when you looked at what happened to Ulfric.

_Must be trying to make up for the fact he will be given the High Kingship because of his stabilising nature, not his ability as a warrior,_ Irkand mused idly as he watched Balgruuf test the swing of his surprisingly plain sword of SkyForge Steel.

The Companions, all of them, were gathered here. Celende was discussing tactics with more intelligence than he expected of Ralinde's daughter raised by Nords. "Today is not our glory, but that of the Dragonborn," she was telling her people. Even Vignar, eighty if he was a day, was amongst them! "If you die and reach Sovngarde… There is no shame in hiding until the Dragonborns arrive. Because Alduin's mists will choke you thick and I wouldn't want to see any of my Shield-Siblings go kicking down his scaly throat."

"A true Companion doesn't hide!" Vignar snapped.

"A true Companion doesn't play politics, but you did that anyway," a hulking brute of a Nord, even by their standards, pointed out calmly. Irkand recalled he was the one who'd helped find them at Swindler's Den.

Remarkably, Vignar shut up. Irkand never thought he'd see the day, especially after his tirade the other day about Tolal and Thorald's relationship.

"If you're lucky, there'll be Blades from Heaven Reach's Temple still around," Celende continued with a hooded glance at Irkand. "They've sworn to await the return of Alduin."

"I would bet that Alduin ate his most devoted enemies first," Irkand pointed out.

"I think you _hope_ that, kinsman, because I bet Julius and Arius will have plenty to say about your actions."

"As much as your mother would say about yours." Irkand couldn't help the dig at the young Altmer after her hypocrisy. He was what he was: a weapon forged by the Blades and sharpened by the Alik'r.

"I think Ralinde would approve, seeing as she's in the stars with Talos," Tolal said casually as she climbed down from the trap. Her companions today would be Esbern, Thorald and Oleg; Irkand had been allowed to bring Delphine and Tammas. "Maybe not about the whole killing Thalmor and werewolf fetish you've got going on, but being a Companion."

"Sounds like Mother." Celende's voice was a little sad. "She loved Talos, you know that?"

"He loves her too from what he said," Tolal assured the Altmer gently. "He approved of her and Esbern."

The Blades loremaster bowed his head in silent gratitude. It was strange to see the man in comfortable black linen robes, sash tied as the Blades did, his wazikashi thrust through the cloth belt. But it was also right.

"And this is why, kinswoman, I swallow words from you that others would be split in two by Wuuthrad for," Celende told the Norc with a mixture of wryness and grief. "You're a good woman trying to help, even if you're from the Pale with the tact and eloquence of a drunken horker."

"I'm still more tactful than Vilkas," Tolal retorted easily. "Remember the time you got lost on the way to Ysgramor's Tomb and I had to take you there, big guy?"

Judging by the way Vilkas – a lean Nord with intense eyes – cringed, he remembered all too well. Judging by the way Farkas and Aela roared with laughter, they remembered too and found it… amusing.

"…I haven't heard this story. When you come back from Sovngarde, you'll have to come up to Jorrvaskr and tell us," Celende said with a grin.

"No, she doesn't," Vilkas muttered.

"Pfft. I'll tell it now…" So began a long, convoluted story about three lost Companions, a snow bear, two horkers and Tolal that ended with, "That's the one and only time I've ever seen a horker wearing an Amulet of Mara."

By the end of it, everyone – well, everyone who was a Nord, a Norc or raised by them – was doubled over and laughing so hard they were crying, even Thorald who was finishing the last rune etched into heavy chains. Delphine shook her head in bemusement while Tammas, who was becoming fonder of Skyrim than he ought to be as an Alik'r, was grinning broadly.

"I have _got_ to put that one in the Poetic Edda," Oleg laughed. "Don't worry, Vilkas, I could change your name if you like."

"Only if you can call him Sulkas," Farkas suggested with a sly twinkle to his eye. It seemed he was slightly more intelligent than Irkand expected.

Tammas coughed awkwardly. "My uncle's called that," he said wryly. "And trust me, your brother has no wish to be mistaken for my uncle."

Irkand looked up at the sky. He really didn't want to comment on Sulkas if he could help it. Most people didn't. "Are we ready?" he asked, voice cutting smoothly through the lingering amusement in the Nord crowd. "Every hour we linger, Alduin fattens on the souls of your heroes."

"Done," Thorald answered, rising to his feet from the last great chain. He wore the Bow of Auri-El and those sun-bright elven arrows.

"Alright. Archers – that's Oleg, Aela and Thorald – to the right balcony. Mages – that's you, Esbern, to the left. We are aiming to cripple, not kill. Not until we have the answers we seek. Skirmishers – that's Balgruuf, Irileth, Ria, Athis, Delphine and Tammas – to the back. Brawlers – Farkas, Vilkas, Njada, Torvar, myself – to the front. Dragonborns, I trust you to place yourselves." Celende issued a set of orders crisply.

"Thorald, cover Esbern. Esbern, focus on healing," Tolal ordered. "I want to see us all on the other side."

Celende nodded in Tolal's changing of the tactics slightly. "Place yourself and make peace with the gods. For tonight, at least two of us will be dining in Sovngarde."

She was competent and Irkand felt relief that someone else was issuing the commands. He wished that he could be elsewhere – Tolal was competent enough to deal with Alduin – but he knew that if he hadn't agreed to return to Whiterun, he and the Alik'r would have been hunted and executed for cowardice by the Nords. _Not_ a fate he wanted to befall them when Hammerfell needed him.

Most of the Nords' prayers were quick. Tolal moved amongst them, handing out bone amulets carved with different things. When she got to Irkand, she offered one. "It's a hunting amulet that will make your blade bite harder," she said quietly. "Not too much, but enough."

He donned it, feeling the smooth brown-grey ivory beneath his fingers. "What was it made from?"

"Dragonbone," Tolal answered with a tight smile. "From the teeth of Mirmulnir, the first dovah I killed."

There was a gift in that. Most of the others wore simple horker ivory pendants. "Thank you," he said sincerely.

"Dragons can die. It takes a bit of work and being clever, but it can happen." Tolal's turquoise eyes were calm as the seas off Sentinel on a summer's day. "I know it must have taken a lot to face your fear of dragons to be here, but you came. That counts for something, kinsman."

"Thank you," Irkand said, faking his own serenity. How could she be so calm when they were going to trap a dragon who hated humanity?

"Want to Shout or shall I?"

"You Shout and I'll keep it down."

Tolal paused and nodded before taking her place. "Prepare yourselves! I Shout in a count of ten…. Nine…"

Irkand hurriedly prepared himself. Soon, they would face a dragon. He hoped they would kill it soon.

…

"You're unchaining it!"

"Tey isn't strong enough to haul us both to Skuldafn," Tolal answered tersely. 'So yes, I'm unchaining the big-ass dragon who could have made us walk to Skuldafn and look like idiots instead of being upfront about what we faced."

"If we're on its back, it could dump us and Alduin would win!" Irkand's voice was losing its smoothness. It seemed being near Odahviing unsettled the hell out of him. Tolal could sympathise with the guy as he'd survived Helgen but he needed to stop referring to the dragon as 'it' and gird his loins.

"Him, not it. And our Voices have beaten his; until Alduin defeats us, we are… Thurii – Overlords."

"Rok los nikriin ahrk nunon hin zul viik zey, Dovahkiin," Odahviing noted sardonically.

"Rok neilaas Helgen," she answered.

"You speak Dovahzul like a Greybeard," Esbern said proudly.

"I had Tey to teach me. And to understand your prey, you need to understand their language."

"Dovahkiin, Ah-Kah-Nid lost nufost naal Alduini Thu'um zul. Rok fen kos nivos wah lov mok dahik do tol viik ol dovah. Nii los . .. neilaasend drenkiin." _Dragonborn, Ah-Kah-Niid was quailed by Alduin's Thu'um. He will be unable to approach him because of that defeat as a dovah. It is a... survival instinct._

Tolal swore as Odahviing spoke. Then she translated softly for Irkand and no one else.

The dragon-eyed man, who was in thrall to his dovah nature through not understanding it, glared at Odahviing. "What does this mean?"

The scarlet creature eyed him amusedly. "It means that you quail like a coward."

"I drove him away from the Throat of the World. Tolal hasn't even faced him, but I faced him twice and lived."

"You kept him grounded while we and Paarthunax did the work," Tammas the Alik'r corrected waspishly. "Give credit where it's due, Irkand, and accept your fears."

Irkand shifted uncomfortably. "I look forward to leaving Skyrim."

"Trust us, we look forward to your leaving," Balgruuf agreed sardonically.

Tolal wasn't up to dealing with this crap. Whatever fear and grief in Irkand's life had festered deep inside and all the lancing she offered was being ignored. But he was family, even if he was a self-centred fucked-up member, and she owed it to him to try while he was in Skyrim. Only not today.

"Get on the fucking dragon or be cut down as a coward," she said grimly. "If I face Alduin alone, so be it. But I will not see your fear of Alduin keep you from the battle."

"Unchain the dragon!" Balgruuf yelled to Torvar, who was at the winch.

"You shittin' me?" he asked. "We just got him in there!"

"I'm not shitting you, whelp. Release the dragon!"

"Your funeral."

The heavy yoke came off Odahviing's throat and he swallowed thickly. "It is wise when you understand you have only one choice," he rumbled.

Tolal turned to Thorald, who had come down from the balcony where he protected Esbern. "Thorald…"

"Normally I would say 'May you never leave Sovngarde' but I hope you do today," the Grey-Mane said simply. "Return to me, Tolal-Em-Ah."

The way he said her draconic name made desire, slow and sweet as winter honey, curl through her veins. "I will," she promised huskily. "And I'll ride you like a fishing boat: wet and rocking."

Thorald grinned fiercely before kissing her hard. "I look forward to it."

By the time he'd released her, Irkand had climbed onto the dragon's back with an ashen face. When they returned from Sovngarde, she'd have to escort him to the Hammerfell border because it would be best if he left Skyrim and never came back.

She mounted the long-suffering Odahviing, listening to the blessings and wishes of good luck from the crowd. It was time to face the culmination of the Prophecy of the Dragonborn… Shor, Kaan and Hircine watch over them all.


	11. Every One of Us Dies

Note: Thanks for reading and reviewing! Trigger warning for violence and implied post-partum depression.

…

…**Every One of Us Dies**

Ulfric had never been happier to see people as he was to see the two Dragonborns, even if Irkand was looking ill at the thought of being Sovngarde and Tolal didn't seem impressed to see him and the Stormcloaks who'd gathered in one of the sheltered valleys concealed by Alduin's mists. "Pack up and move out!" he ordered the men who'd died for him. "We follow the Dragonborn!"

The hollow cheers that accompanied his statement warmed his dead heart. He had broken at the soul-snare Alduin set but would follow Irkand and Tolal to Sovngarde and its bright safety.

"Welcome, wayfarers grim, to the flowered fields of Shor's rest for weary heroes," he said quietly. "I am glad to see that on this day, the soul-snare of the World-Eater, Hero's Bane, will be undone."

Irkand sighed. "I'm glad to see you survived," he told the Stormcloak commander. "…Well, relatively speaking."

Ulfric grinned at the man. "You might be the only Ra Gada to treat Sovngarde's soft grass, battle-brother."

"I hope I will be soon gone," Irkand answered fervently.

"So do a lot of people," Tolal growled. "Let's go."

They marched through the mists, collecting everything from Imperial soldiers to High King Torygg, who surely had no right to be here. "Ralof Stormblade rules as Jarl of Windhelm," Irkand said softly as Tolal spoke to the dead boy. "He threw his support behind Balgruuf on the condition that Skyrim remains free of the Empire."

Ulfric sighed in relief. "Then I died not in vain and may be at peace in Shor's shining hall."

"_I'll_ be at peace when the World-Eater's dead," Irkand growled bitterly. "I know Skyrim's your home but because I have a healthy fear of the World-Eater, the Nords of Whiterun think I am a coward. Even the dragon I helped defeat that brought us to Skuldafn thinks I'm a coward."

"All men have a fear that breaks them," Ulfric assured the Ra Gada. "You are here, facing Alduin despite your fear. That is enough for me to honour you, battle-brother."

Irkand's grin was sardonic. "Tolal threatened to cut me down for cowardice if I refused."

With the insight of a dead man, Ulfric saw the fear which festered and curdled inside Irkand's soul. "She is trying to lance your soul-wound, I think," he said.

"Perhaps. But now isn't the time." Irkand squared his shoulders. "I see lights in the distance."

They reached Tsun, Shield-Thane of Shor, and were tested. Irkand point-blank refused and told the minor deity that he had no wish to enter the Hall of Valour as being here was bad enough. Tolal shook her head before fighting with axe in one hand and flame in the other, refusing to use her Voice to bring Tsun to his knees. When the Shield-Thane helped her to her feet (you only needed to fight bravely and strike true to enter Sovngarde, otherwise no mortal would feast within), he asked her why.

"Speak only in True Need," she replied calmly. "I use my Voice only when I or someone I am sworn to defend are in great danger."

Tsun nodded slowly. "Are you afraid of your Voice, Tolal-Em-Ah?"

"Yes." The admission was stark. "Talos had this power and he killed a lot of people with it. Ulfric too. I see the Greybeards with their gags, unable to speak lest they shake the world apart. When this is over, I hope never to Shout again."

"You are a dragon. It is in your nature to Speak." But Tsun was smiling. "Perhaps you can turn the Thu'um to a gentler path and teach the dovahhe of mercy and compassion."

"I'd never thought of that," the Dragonborn admitted.

Tsun tested the rest of them and allowed all of Ulfric's Stormcloaks to enter. When it came to Ulfric, the Shield-Thane regarded him coldly. "You have profaned a sacred gift," he said flatly.

"I did what I had to for Skyrim," Ulfric retorted.

"Glad am I that I share not the journey's end with you and Torygg, honour unstained for dying with head held high in the face of his killer," the god rumbled disapprovingly. "Now ready yourself!"

Tsun pushed hard but eventually allowed Ulfric inside. They passed over the Whalebone Bridge but for Irkand, who stood in that blessed space even Alduin could not enter, and came to the doors of the Hall of Valour. They allowed Tolal to open the doors and they entered into the bright glory of journey's end for heroes grim and brave.

…

Arius Aurelius tightened his sash as a Nord Blade, who guarded the door which separated Heaven's Reach Temple and its Akaviri austerity from the rollicking good time that was Sovngarde, entered the room. "The Dragonborn is here," she announced tersely. "The other waits outside, for he is a Redguard and has no wish to enter Shor's honoured hall."

"Two Dragonborn? That explains some of the disparity in the Prophecies." The Akaviri had several prophecies that weren't generally known, even to the priests of Talos or the general run of Blades, referring to the Empty Hunter and the Honeybee. Arius knew who the Empty Hunter was – he'd looked into his son's eyes the day he was born and seen the draconic slit in them before weaving powerful Illusion spells that would only fade when he Shouted.

_I hope the Honeybee is Lia. She always was a sweet child._ But how much of that would have survived the horrors of Cloud Ruler and the Great Chapel?

He entered the rowdy feasting hall and accepted a flagon of mead from the serving man going around. Arius had developed a taste for the hearty beverage and with Alduin on their doorstep, believed himself due a drink or five.

Shor, bright and grim, sat upon the throne as Ysgramor (good for a game of stones) approached a tall, black-haired woman with honey-bronze skin. Her furs were… Nordic. Very much so. But well-made and studded with orichalcum; judging by the axe on her hip, Hrafn had raised her. He knew her eyes even across the hall.

The heroes following her scattered towards the hall's four quarters as Arius strode towards the legendary Nord King and his granddaughter. He hoped to learn something of her life and how she had managed to _shine_ with such warmth. A dragon's power was hot and thick – he knew from experience – but Lia's was… not muted. But softened. This woman was no tyrant.

"-Your mother feasts with Kodlak and Skjorr, with whom she fought often in the Great War, though I cannot say how glad she would be of your presence," Ysgramor was saying. "You were her only child and a difficult birth."

"What of Dag Foam-Breaker and his wife Adelheide?" she asked in a slightly growling voice.

"Your foster father feasts with us but your foster mother is with Kyne," Ysgramor answered with surprising gentleness.

Lia nodded sadly. "She had the straw-death. I am not surprised."

Ysgramor looked over his shoulder to nod politely at Arius. "And here comes your father's father, Tolal-Em-Ah, the last Grand Master of the Blades."

This close to her, Arius was almost overwhelmed by the sheer _presence_ in Tolal-Em-Ah's (her draconic name, obviously) eyes. In Sovngarde, all men were distilled to their truest essence, and so it was with even the living who came here. _"Honey-Bee-Hunter,"_ he inwardly translated, absorbing the essence of her words.

He bowed formally in the Akaviri manner, a low straight motion that he held for twenty seconds as was appropriate for a Blade in the presence of the Dragonborn. But she caught his forearms and raised him up with a slightly bemused smile.

"I'm not Talos," she said dryly. "No need to bow like that, Grandfather."

Tolal was a weathered woman with her Norc ancestry prominent in the delicate under-fangs and the heavy bone structure of her features, but she was a striking one at that. "I knew Irkand was Dragonborn but never expected the little girl who once ate all my honeycakes to be the other Dragonborn of prophecy," Arius admitted quietly.

"The Blades knew there'd be two? Why didn't Esbern get it from Alduin's Wall…" She shook her head, dismissing the prophecies casually. She could do that as they were at the endgame. "I wish Irkand had known he was Dragonborn. Alduin scares the crap out of him."

Her rough voice conveyed a complex mixture of emotion concerning her uncle: a little compassion leavened by far too much contempt and concern. If she was raised as a Norc, she'd no doubt despise anyone frightened of the World-Eater. Arius sighed and shook his head; when this was over, he would need to speak to his younger son. "You do know he's your uncle?"

"Unfortunately. He's considered nithing in the Hold where I'm a Thane because he refused to pay a bounty and honourgeld for various crimes that ended in a woman being kidnapped, every bit of livestock in the place killed and a number of people – including my in-laws – starving and generally being disrespectful to the Jarl." Tolal's expression was now grim. "He also helped assassinate Titus Mede II and will be one of the Redguards' greatest weapons in their bid for the Ruby Throne."

"Given we were sold out by the Emperor to preserve his wretched White-Gold Concordat, I find it hard to have sympathy for Titus Mede," Arius answered dryly. "Your uncle was born and raised for results, not coddling the ego of some provincial Nord petty king."

"Balgruuf will be the new High King of Skyrim," Tolal retorted, her tone equally as dry. "I don't expect you to understand; you're not a Nord… or Norc, in my case."

Ysgramor's face was grave. "Tolal has no stake in the quarrel between the Thalmor and the Blades," he told the Grand Master. "Her concerns are for Skyrim."

"I understand." Arius sighed. "When Alduin is banished, I will speak to Irkand."

He gestured to a bench. "I assume by that katana you've been trained by the Blades."

"Esbern is my advisor and Delphine is a rabid dog. The Blades as an order are dead." There was no malice in her voice, only simple honesty, but Arius still quailed at her brutal bluntness.

"Then you have no right to wear the katana," the Grand Master spoke.

"Its name is Dragonbane and once I am done here, it will hang in Sky Haven Temple, which will become a College for the mages of Skyrim." Tolal's jaw was set as her mother's had been when Sigdrifa was in a mood to be difficult. Arius lamented that the sweet little girl he recalled had been raised by Nords of the hairiest sort.

"The dragons of Skyrim will not flee with Alduin's death," he warned.

"No, but if Odahviing's attitude is anything to go by, they'll leave me the hell alone because I will have defeated Alduin. That's why Irkand's scared of him; the World-Eater kicked his arse all over Helgen." Tolal smiled slightly. "I follow the Hunter's way and I don't bother creatures that aren't a danger to me or others. Hell, I got a draconic friend called Tey."

Arius swallowed his indignant shock that a descendant of both Talos and the Dragonguard was a friend with a dragon. Tey meant 'Tale'. Maybe he was Kynareth's servant Teyfunvahzah. "I… see," he said, managing to hide most of his distaste.

"No, you don't." Tolal sounded sorrowful. "But I have no wish to fight with you. Maybe when this is over, we can talk again before I return to Nirn."

She nodded and turned to Ysgramor. "Where's my father Dag?" she asked.

The Father-King of the Nords gave her directions and Tolal vanished into the crowds, Arius watching her go regretfully. The legacy of the Aurelii meant _nothing_ to her and it broke his heart. But he was dead and could do little about it.

…

"So. My daughter is Dragonborn."

"And so's my uncle by blood," the Norc woman with honey-bronze skin told Dag, a burly warrior with long cornsilk hair and a wry smile. "Turns out I'm a Norc from Half-Moon Hold with Aurelii ancestry. I like my Norcish kin. But every Aurelii I've met is either crazy, an arsehole or both."

Sigdrifa spat out her mead. Her daughter was the Dragonborn? The weak little thing with big eyes?

Dying had been something of a relief for Sigdrifa. She'd covered Lia's body with her own because no child deserved the death a Thalmor would give but she was glad to have no more worries beyond fighting, feasting and occasionally fucking. Everyone had told her that being a mother would fulfil her but all Sigdrifa had felt was constant depression once she'd spawned one daughter and been too damaged from Arius' refusal to bring a proper midwife into Cloud Ruler to bear further children. By then, it was a relief because she'd stopped respecting Rustem, who'd preferred Delphine to her.

Kodlak, his gaze wise, pounded her on the back instinctively as Lia – called Tolal, a good Norcish-sounding same – chattered with the man who'd raised her. "Ragnar's boy sunk my fucking boat?" Dag roared. "I'll kick Eirik's arse around Sovngarde a few times for that!"

Tolal looked shaken. "That… He's _here_?"

"Fell prey to bandits after his boat – which was mine – sank."

"I thought… Shor's stones…" Tolal sighed, shaking her head. "I thought he was alive and drunk in Dawnstar."

"Ah, my darling daughter." The love in Dag's tone made Sigdrifa flinch. Durak her father had been gruff, reserving his affection for the sons who would follow in his wake and sparing little for his daughters. Mothers loved daughters, her own mother Sofja had said. But Sigdrifa never had. Well, not as they told her she should.

"Dag, forgive my interruption," Kodlak said formally. "But does Tolal Dragon-Born have news of the Companions?"

"Harbinger." Tolal bowed respectfully. "Celende – another cousin of mine – is Harbinger and wields the reforged Wuuthrad. She's mated to Aela the Huntress, the twins are free of Hircine's influence, and my man Thorald Grey-Mane will follow in his father's footsteps as a wondersmith."

Kodlak and Skjor exchanged smiles. "Thank you for humouring an old man," the Harbinger told the Norc.

"Any messages for the living? Maybe you could talk some sense into Celende," Tolal suggested with a growl.

Kodlak's expression was grim. "Celende is the Harbinger the Companions need when the Thalmor rise again," he answered.

"I'll take that as a no."

Dag's eyebrow was raised. "You're married to one of the Grey-Manes?"

"Will be when I get back. I'm even a Thane of Whiterun." Dag's eyebrow rose higher and Tolal regarded him with her hands on her hips. "Don't look at me like that. We both know Skald wouldn't make a Norc a Thane even _after_ she helped a Priest of Mara save Dawnstar from a Daedric Prince."

"A plainsman?" Dag's voice was almost scandalised.

"Da, he's a wondersmith!"

"I don't give a horker's arse if he was Talos reborn. A plainsman! How will you be able to fish properly if he's puking up on the boat every five minutes?"

"Given we'll be in the Reach or Whiterun, it won't be a problem." Tolal's expression was sad. "Da, I'm a Dragonborn and Thane now. I'm glad you and Ma raised me instead of my Imperial relatives, but I can't go back to living on the floes and thinking only of myself. I got siblings who fly around and breathe fire, an Altmer cousin with serious issues, some very wise and wonderful Norc kinfolk…"

"I know, my Tollie." Dag smiled affectionately and ruffled the Dragonborn's hair. "Go and kick that oversized lizard's backside for us. I want to see if Sovngarde has a sea."

"I will, Da." Tolal smiled at him, a daughter's loving smile, before offering polite nods to Kodlak and Skjor. She glanced briefly at Sigdrifa and the Norc shieldmaiden raised her flagon in honour of the Dragonborn she'd brought into this world.

Neither said anything to the other, but there was recognition in that glance, and a measure of peace. Sigdrifa returned to her drinking. She would be the first to raise a mug in her daughter's name.

…

"Irkand."

The other Dragonborn turned from the mists he peered into as Rustem and several other Blades emerged in the wake of Tolal and three hairy Nords who looked like the three who had banished Alduin. His brother, tall and sinewy, carried his naginata with careless ease.

"Finally, I'm not the only Ra Gada in this place," Irkand said with some relief. One of the other Blades, a Redguard in ornate armour from the Septim era, snickered and joined them.

"Only three sane people in the Temple, right?" he asked.

Rustem chuckled. "Baurus, meet my brother Irkand. Irkand, meet Baurus."

Irkand shook the famous Ra Gada Blade's hand. "A pleasure to meet you."

"And you." Baurus' expression was wryly humorous despite the direness of the situation. "I see you are of the Alik'r."

Irkand nodded. "I took my Blades training and turned them into the force that kicked the Thalmor out of Hammerfell."

_"Nice."_ Rustem and Baurus spoke in unison. Death had removed much of his brother's surly demeanour. Irkand supposed no longer having their father's hopes on his shoulders was good for him.

"Word is you got Titus Mede II," Rustem continued.

"I did."

"Good. That bastard sold us out." Rustem smiled slightly. "I hope Delphine was there to see it."

Irkand sighed. "She wasn't. But she's working with me. It's been… awkward."

"Still in love with her?" It seemed death had also removed the filter between brain and mouth Rustem once had.

But it was a question that made Irkand pause and think. Once he'd been in love with Delphine – mostly because they were much alike and perhaps because she was sleeping with Rustem – but now…

"…No," he said slowly, a little sadly. "She's tried to manipulate Tolal and I."

Rustem nodded. "Years of running and hiding will have done that to her. By the way, little brother, you look like shit."

Irkand managed a wry smile. "Alduin's tried to eat me twice."

"And you're scared of him?"

"…Yes. Terrified. And Tolal and her Nord friends have little sympathy for me."

"Well, _of course_. Because being scared requires intelligence and imagination, two things many Nords lack."

Baurus raised an eyebrow. "One of them is your daughter, Rustem."

"I know. Lord, I know." Rustem's broad shoulders squared. "Suppose I should go speak to her or something."

"She's not much impressed by our side of the family," Irkand told his brother wryly. "I spent thirty years trying to find her and she turns out to be…"

"_I'm_ not much impressed by our side of the family," Rustem observed dryly. "Did Father ever tell you the big secret about our ancestry?"

"Big secret?" Irkand was a little confused.

"We're technically Septims, as if being the grandsons of a bastard's bastard counted for something in the Empire."

That… explained a lot of his father's attitude and why Arius felt he had something to prove. Julius had never cared much on what others thought, but he had been the only son of the Hero of Kvatch, who would become the Madgoddess.

To Rustem, it meant little as he was dead. To Irkand… it was… important. Perhaps he would find a bride from the kin of his Alikr' brethren. High King Sura might be… interested.

"Brother, the Ra Gada intend to take the Ruby Throne," Irkand said softly. "It might be this will change… everything."

"Irkand, you're nearly sixty," Rustem pointed out. "What could you gain from becoming the Emperor?"

The Alik'r warrior stretched out his fingers; judging by the posture of Tolal as the Nords spoke to Tsun, they were nearly ready to begin. "Titus Mede II is dead and so Cyrodiil will be in chaos," he said. "If I can hit hard and fast, as we did at Valenwood, we could at least establish a beachhead into the Imperial Province. Skyrim isn't worth conquering; I'd rather have them as allies and give them Bruma."

"Would Tolal be your heir?" Baurus asked, intrigued.

Irkand's bray of laughter drew several eyes to him. "Tolal doesn't have an ambitious bone in her body," he said. "Nor do I, for that matter, but I can see no other way to bring Cyrodiil under Hammerfell's banner before the Dominion tries to destroy us again."

"You'll need to prove bloodline. Honestly, Julius should have gone for the Ruby Throne, only he was more worried about the Thalmor," Rustem mused. "Irkand, is this a way to prove you're not a coward to a pack of Nords?"

"If we are strong enough to hold it, brother, we are worthy of it." Irkand worked best when he had defined goals for short, medium and long term. Pacifying Cyrodiil – a plan that was already well in the execution stages – was such a goal for him. He could at least make a damned good start on taking the Imperial Province.

Sura would welcome an heir with Septim blood. He had a few daughters, some of whom numbered amongst the Alik'r. It would work out.

Rustem had been raised an Imperial and wouldn't understand. But Baurus was already nodding thoughtfully. "As I understand, the original plan was for Ocanto to be Potentate until Martin Julius reached manhood," the Blade said quietly. "But when the Chancellor died, the only Imperial bureaucrat with knowledge the Septim bloodline continued was lost, and for Northstar to press her son's claim would have been… ugly."

"Imperials and those who serve them keep everything in triplicate," Irkand said dryly. "Perhaps it is time I returned to Cloud Ruler and see what lies in the deepest vaults."

"And maybe nothing does." Rustem's voice was suddenly grim. "Marius betrayed us at Cloud Ruler and no doubt Pale Pass."

"And he's still alive." Irkand swore softly as Tolal neared. "I'll see him dead, if nothing else."

"Lia," Rustem greeted politely, nodding to his daughter.

"…Rustem? Esbern said you fought with a spear."

"Naginata," Rustem corrected absently. "You were a scrawny kid. Good to see you survived."

"Thanks. Hunting horkers on ice floes tends to build up muscle." Tolal looked pointedly at Irkand. "Uncle speak to you about being scared shitless of Alduin?"

"Everyone with half a brain's scared shitless of Alduin," Rustem said quietly. "He's here and fighting, Lia. That counts for something."

It was more praise than Irkand had ever expected from his brother and he flushed with pleasure. Tolal set her jaw stubbornly and made to argue, but the old Nord who'd banished Alduin with an Elder Scroll placed a hand on her shoulder.

"Dragonborn, Alduin approaches. We must prepare ourselves."

Irkand exchanged glances with his brother and Baurus as they fell into familiar Blades stances. "Shall we show the Nords how it's done properly, sons of the sand?"

"Hell yeah."


	12. Dragonslayers

Note: Thanks for reading and reviewing! Here's the big one, folks! Dawnguard will be happening in the next story. :) Trigger warning for disabling injury.

…

**Dragonslayers**

_LOK VAH KOOR!_

Tolal really could have used this Shout the day her boat sank off Winterhold. With four Voices united (Irkand had never learned the Shout while Tey had taught her), it dispelled the mist until Alduin called it back. Then they dispersed it. Rinse and repeat until on the third time, Alduin showed up to express his displeasure at his meal being interrupted.

This was the first time Tolal had seen Alduin in the flesh. It was sad how clichéd the dovah was with his ebon hide and scarlet eyes. _"Joor Zah Frul!"_ she Shouted, the Words slipping out to ensnare the dragon in purple light.

Alduin looked at her with baleful eyes as he landed, the signal for the warriors to close in. "Tolal-Em-Ah," he crooned. "Your soul will be sweet."

Tolal closed her eyes against the _force_ of his Voice. Perhaps she should be more understanding of Irkand's fear of the World-Eater. But this was the endgame and she wouldn't falter now. "If I don't kill you, Irkand will," she answered. "Should have stayed where you were banished and waited for your appointed time."

Irkand hit Alduin with Dragonrend, his Words tearing and painful. Tolal shuddered to hear her uncle Shout, wondering how one man could live with so much hate and fear in him. It would fester his soul in the end and should he die, he'd likely join the Daedra.

It was a round-robin game that Alduin lost. Somewhat appropriately, it was Ulfric who scored the finishing blow, sliding along Alduin's scaly throat with a broadsword to render him unable to Shout. Fire instead of blood poured out as the World-Eater Shouted something to Akatosh before exploding into nothingness.

When it was done, the mists faded to reveal Sovngarde's true beauty. Tolal inhaled the scent of flowers and snow. It was finished.

"Well, that was a little anticlimactic," complained her father, a tall Redguard with sinewy muscles and a wry glint to his eye. "Eons of anticipation and he just explodes! I was hoping for something a bit more spectacular."

"What, like Martin Septim's statue?" Irkand asked, his silk-smooth voice lighter. Talking to his brother had made things a bit better for him but the glint in his eye had changed. It was a glint that worried Tolal.

"You mean our forefather's statue," Rustem corrected softly, so softly that at first, Tolal thought she hadn't heard him correctly.

_I'm a… Septim?_ It would explain why the Thalmor did their damnedest to kill her, a descendant of Talos! No wonder Talos had come to her after rejecting Delphine…

_The Redguards want to conquer Cyrodiil. If we're Septims and Irkand can prove it…_

War. Dovahhe were territorial and aggressive. If Irkand had justification, even as old as he was, he could take the throne readily enough and sire a child.

"If you bring war to Skyrim, you may find that this rekdovah will forget you are kin," she growled aloud.

"You could make yourself High Queen. Balgruuf's reluctant to rule Skyrim," Irkand answered.

"I could have married him and been Queen regardless," Tolal pointed out quietly. "The war I prepare for will be the one involving the Dominion. Darkness is coming, Ah-Kah-Niid, a darkness that makes Alduin seem tame. Think on that before you claim the Ruby Throne."

Irkand regarded her strangely. This uncle of hers and she never understood each other. What good was strength but to protect kin and hearth? Even Talos regretted his actions at Sancre Tor.

Tsun approached them and bowed. "Well done. Alduin is banned and banished until his proper time. Shor, my lord, offers hospitality until you desire to return to Nirn. And when your time is come, Sovngarde's bright welcome awaits you."

Tolal bowed in reply. "Even should I suffer the winter-death or straw-death?"

"Even so, Tolal-Em-Ah."

"Then I am grateful for the Lord of the Slain's gift."

"I'll pass," Irkand responded. "I would prefer the Far Shores of the Ra Gada."

Tsun nodded gravely. "As you wish, Empty Hunter. Shor wants only the willing for the end of times. He offers you another boon instead: a Shout to call any of the Blades to your side, for no hero of Sovngarde would answer your need."

"If you don't call for me on a regular basis, I'll be greatly offended," the ornately armoured Redguard who'd watched Irkand's back drawled sardonically.

"I could never allow that to happen, Baurus," Irkand said, squaring his shoulders. "Is Father here?"

"Yes, sitting and talking with the other Grand Masters, I imagine," Rustem answered. "Tolal was… fairly terse with him."

"My niece sadly has no understanding of her paternal heritage," Irkand said mildly. "I guess that's what happens when you're raised by Nords."

"Given that the Aurelii were a fairly fucked-up lot, I'm glad she was raised in Skyrim," growled a Norcish woman of astounding ugliness who had just crossed the Whalebone Bridge. "To you, Tolal-Em-Ah, I raise my flagon!"

Tolal inclined her head as the woman she suspected was her mother did just that. There was pain there from what Esbern said, and as Sovngarde was journey's rest and heart's ease, she'd let it go.

But there were words she had to say. "Ah-Kah-Niid," she told him in Dovahzul. "The Ruby Throne will not ease the emptiness you feel. Only coming to terms with your shame will."

Though he was a dovah in thrall to his nature, though he didn't know it, she still felt compelled to try and show him the way to healing himself for he was kin. She was a Norc and it was what they did.

"I have no reason to be ashamed despite what you Nords may think," Irkand responded grimly. "And don't worry, Tolal, you can have that worthless shithole you call a homeland. I'll be glad to wash my hands of it."

The divide between them was only five paces wide… but was as bottomless as the chasm beneath the Whalebone Bridge. Tolal had tried to extend her hand, only to be refused, so she did what any sensible Nord did.

She turned to Sovngarde and went to talk to her kin within.

…

As the snow about them cleared, Irkand's soul shuddered at the Voices of the dragons around him. Tolal's expression was rapturous as she chanted in unison with them but he wanted very much to leave.

Paarthunax, second-eldest, climbed down from his peak to regard Irkand and Tolal directly. "Ah-Kah-Niid. Tolal-Em-Ah. It is done. And… yet I sorrow."

The Norc gently touched the old dragon's snout fearlessly. "It's hard when one of your kin is so bound up with his arrogance and anger that he can't see what he's doing is wrong."

Irkand's fists clenched. Tolal seemed absolutely uncaring of the fact she was technically a Septim, happy to submit to a gold-hungry king because she wanted peace. For thirty years he'd searched and fought for this niece of his… and she turned out to be not worth the effort.

Paarthunax's gaze turned on the Ra Gada. "Your future is a grim and bloody one," the dovah said flatly. "Your sins will come to haunt you, Ah-Kah-Niid, as soon as you descend from this mountain. You have read of the Oghma Infinium. You slew your liege-lord. And you would take a throne never meant to be yours."

"I am a Septim." It felt right to say that.

"As is Tolal and the kiirre you left in your wake unknowing," Paarthunax answered. "You have a void in your soul. Be wary what fills it."

"I killed Alduin, dragon. Don't make me add you to the list."

"It was Ulfric who killed Alduin. You just helped with the Shouts." Tolal's expression was sad. "Stop this. I can't stop you from going for the Ruby Throne but if you threaten any of our siblings without cause-"

"These monsters are not our kin!" Irkand snarled. "I know being raised by Nords has left you deficient of intelligence but even you should see that!"

"We are all the children of Kaan," Tolal answered, great eyes stricken with pain. "And… I'm sorry, Irkand. I can't stop you being Dragonborn, but I can make sure you won't be another Talos. _IIZ!_"

Irkand found himself bound within ice just long enough for Tolal to loom up in the snow, a big-eyed nightmare, and punch him in the throat so hard that something cracked. Then the golden light of a healing spell surrounded them both.

"You will be able to whisper and perhaps even talk but Shouting is beyond you now," the huntress said over her shoulder as she walked away. "Talos sacrificed His Voice for the Ruby Throne because He knew He couldn't have them both. You've made your choice, Irkand, and may the gods watch over you for we're done."

The snow swirled up around him and obscured his eyes. When it was done, he found himself alone on the Throat of the World, not a dragon – winged or human – in sight. Delphine was right – he should have killed them all.

_Have your fucking snowbound wasteland,_ Irkand snarled inwardly as he turned for the path to take him from this hellhole. _When the Thalmor come, the Alik'r won't be there to help you._

…

Paarthunax landed gently on the Great Porch as the other dovahhe scattered across Skyrim to seek out strunmahhe of their own. Tolal-Em-Ah slid off his back, expression heartbroken. "I didn't want to do that and it will bite me in the arse somehow," she growled. "But it had to be done."

"His path is still dark and bloody but you have saved many," the older dragon assured her gently. "Perhaps Akatosh spun him out for a reason. Perhaps he is much like Talos."

"He's much like Alduin," she mused. "Always trying to fill something that never can be…"

"Indeed." Paarthunax had seen deeper and further than Tolal realised. "Tolal-Em-Ah, the darkness is nearer than you realise. Tell your mate to be ready for it will come for him and his golden bow."

"Son of a…" The Dragonborn leaned against his dull grey-white flank. "Let me guess, this is another one of Irkand's sins come to haunt us?"

"You are beginning to understand the wuldsetiid," Paarthunax told her gently. "He… aggravated it, but the darkness was always there."

"Oh, for fuck's sake…" She might have said more but the doors opened to reveal several armed Nords, Tolal-Em-Ah's mate first amongst them. He ran to her, kissing her fiercely and uncaring of Paarthunax in the way.

The old dovah took advantage of the opportunity to observe joor mating behaviour. Looking to and fro on their wuldsetiid, he found it a little… disgusting. And humans liked it that way!

Balgruuf, who had studied at High Hrothgar, bowed respectfully to Paarthunax. "Greetings, old one," he said in decent Dovahzul. "My apologies for the… ah… welcome."

"I came unexpectedly to bear Tolal-Em-Ah here lest Ah-Kah-Niid take exception to her removing his Voice," Paarthunax assured the Junseahrol. "I will return to High Hrothgar."

"Can I pat him?" asked a rekjoor on the verge of adulthood.

"Dovahhe aren't pets you can pat," Tolal pointed out wryly.

She was ignored as three kiirre began to stroke Paarthunax's scales.

"Not a word," he growled in Dovahzul to Odahviing, who hovered just above with a draconic smirk on his face, and Teyfunvahzah, who'd winged in from his strunmah in the Reach.

"I would not dream of it, Old One," the red dragon responded dryly.

"I can," Tey said cheerfully. "Just make sure they know which bit is your tail."

Tolal shook her head with a sigh as Oleg, a Norc who was learning their language far too quickly, laughed. That one had quite the… destiny… ahead of him.

"I hope I did the right thing," she said to herself. "But it was the only thing I could do."

…

The Vampire Lord passed his hand over the Bloodstone Chalice to dispel the image of Dragonsreach. In the background, his brethren feasted with all the social graces of a Norcish drinking party. It was tedious to be surrounded by more powerful elders who had no sense of politics or manners.

He knew Irkand was getting above himself. He decided to make the other Dragonborn's death quick and painless for her services to the Empire; a vampire Dragonborn would be too dangerous and she was the partner of that Nord with the Bow of Auri-El. A deadly opponent.

Ronthil, a useful courtier often ignored by the elder vampires, entered the room with a pair of enthralled Redguards. "I took the liberty of tracking down some of that Irkand's people," the little Bosmer said cheerfully. "I couldn't find Tammas or Sudrith, but…"

"These will do," the Vampire Lord told his lackey with a smile. "I wish our superiors showed half the initiative you do."

"As do I." Harkon's voice was rich and amused. "The death of Vyrthur was a moderate setback but one which can be surmounted. I'm glad to see, Titus, that you're contributing to the victory of our kind."

The once-and-future Emperor smiled slightly, concealing his fangs and intentions. He yearned for the bloodied sun to regain his lost throne. Soon the Ruby Throne would be red in blood as well as name.

All he had to deal was deal with a couple Nords. Easy enough if he was careful, and in sixty years as the Emperor of Tamriel, Titus Mede II had never been anything less than careful.

_Cyrodiil will worship me once I deliver them from the Thalmor and the Redguards,_ he thought, anticipating the day as Harkon delivered orders. _And Tamriel will be safe once again. Soon._

…

Gelebor blinked at the cold light of the moons as he emerged from Darkfall Passage, the sea crashing against the nearby shore. Auri-El had shown him the prophecy was not yet dealt with but simply diverted – and the Champion of Auri-El had no idea what was coming in his direction.

_At least Alduin is bound to his proper place,_ the snow elf thought as he began to walk to a place he'd seen only in his dreams. A high mountain, redolent with juniper, a sanctum of healing and learning in this cold land.

The last hope of the world, even if they didn't even know it. And behind him, the tide came in, a crimson colour under Masser's light.


End file.
